Your help is needed. Period.
Periods might be tough to talk about sometimes, but they are just a fact of life. Monthly menstruation products are a basic necessity. Nobody should have to pick between feeding their family and being able to afford basic hygiene products. But if you’re living in poverty, access to products can be challenging. For homeless youth or women living on the street – it’s even more challenging. For other people, there are challenges when you consider cultural differences, gender identify, or just the stigma around having a period at all.
Too many young girls and other vulnerable kids are missing days at school because they don’t have period products – in fact nearly 1 in 7 Canadian girls have missed school due to lack of period protection (Confidence and Puberty Study by Always, Proctor & Gamble, 2018). Almost one quarter of Canadian women say they have struggled to afford menstrual products for themselves or their children (Plan International, Period Stigma Report, 2018).
The Period Promise campaign by United Way is mobilizing public opinion about “period poverty.” Local governments, universities, school boards across B.C., unions, BC Federation of Labour and CLC Pacific Region, and local labour councils have all taken a period promise to provide menstrual products for free in their facilities, just like they supply toilet paper.
For the third year in a row, United Way Greater Victoria is aiming to fill a bus with unopened boxes of pads, tampons and diva cups. These products are then distributed to local United Way funded social service agencies to help people in need.
You can help! Collect product at your events, or workplace.
Then drop by and help us fill our bus:
Saturday, March 7, 2020, 11 am to 3 pm
Hillside Centre parking lot, North Dairy Street
If you need more information, contact Holly Page, United Way Greater Victoria, holly.page@uwgv.ca, 250-984-2268.