a message from our founder

Period poverty is neither a new nor a trivial issue. Periods have been preventing women from reaching their full potential for as long as they’ve been around. For millennia, the menstrual cycle has inhibited women’s education, career, and dignity in ways we can’t even imagine, often leading to a lifetime of setbacks. Still, for those of us in developed countries, menstrual stigma may seem like a thing of the past. 

Nothing could be further from the truth. Today, 500 million women lack basic access to menstrual products. At a time when the availability of high-quality sanitary products has never been higher, 500 million women are forced to use makeshift substitutes to get by every month. These women and girls, almost always low-income, are ultimately trapped—unable to erase the pervasive taboos of their community on their own, yet suffering from infections, lowered self-esteem, and a lack of education for a lifetime because of it. 

What’s worse is how little it takes to stop this cycle. A 300 rupee menstrual cup—the equivalent of 4 dollars—lasts a girl for an entire decade. For twenty dollars, a girl’s period can be managed with dignity for her entire life. So why is awareness of this issue still so low? Why does the cause still take a backseat in the eyes of the public, the nonprofit sector, and the government? 

Here at End Period Poverty, we can’t see valid answers to any of these questions. It’s why we founded an initiative whose goal is to serve the cause of period poverty, rather than creating a new NGO specifically for the distribution of menstrual products. We know that there are thousands of NGOs already working tirelessly to improve the lives of women and the health of the planet—and they’re doing amazing work. We want to collaborate with them to put period poverty on the agenda of as many organizations as possible, and, together, work towards bringing “500 million” down to 0.