Going Against the Flow
By Natasha Procenko
Although menstruating persons spend a total of almost seven years of their lives on their period, menstruation has long been a taboo topic. Counter-currents are, however, emerging, and menstruation has in recent years entered the limelight in an unprecedented way. Several news outlets dubbed 2015 “the year of the period” after numerous menstruation-related news items broke, including the stories of a London marathoner who raced while “free-bleeding” and a presidential candidate (now President) who made an ill-received comment, seemingly about menstruation, toward a female debate moderator. This was also the year that Canada’s federal government lifted the tax on menstrual hygiene products, making them more financially accessible to menstruators across the country. Most recently, coding consortium Unicode (which distributes emojis to mobile devices) announced that it will include the “period emoji” in March of this year, in hopes that this will make it easier for women and girls to talk about menstruation.
While these shifts suggest the public taboo is lessening, the actual menstrual hygiene needs of Canadian menstruators will not be met as long as restrooms continue to fail to offer free-of-charge menstrual hygiene products. Both international human rights law, and Canadian equality rights law, support menstrual hygiene products being freely available in restrooms, as are other items such as toilet paper, soap, and hand drying facilities.
Menstrual Hygiene Management (“MHM”) is the term used in the public health sector to refer to the effective and sanitary management of menstruation-related functions.[1] At minimum, effective MHM requires access to clean menstrual management materials, such as sanitary pads and tampons. Lack of effective MHM results in several negative health consequences including discomfort, irritation, and infection. It has also been linked to psychosocial impacts such as feelings of fear, anxiety, body-shame, and self-objectification.[2]
The internationally recognized human right to health not only envisages “the highest attainable standard of health”[3] for all persons, but also requires access to “facilities, goods, services and conditions” necessary for the realization of this standard.[4] When menstrual hygiene products are not offered in restrooms, this right is undermined, as the inability to access hygiene products amounts to ineffective MHM and its associated adverse health outcomes. This is true for the eighty-six percent of menstruating individuals who will unexpectedly begin their period in a public place and without the necessary menstrual hygiene supplies. It is also true for vulnerable populations who routinely face barriers in accessing such materials, such as homeless people, people living in informal settlements, prisoners, people with disabilities, sex workers, residents of remote communities, Indigenous people, and trans men.[5]
Inadequate access to menstrual hygiene products in restrooms also affects the ability to enjoy the human rights of education[6] and work,[7] since ineffective MHM can result in school and employment absenteeism. In employment settings, sixty-four percent of women who got their period without the necessary products had to leave work immediately. Similarly, one in seven girls in Canada have had to either leave school early or miss it entirely because of a lack of access to menstrual hygiene products. Period-related absenteeism is a phenomenon that could easily be mitigated if such materials were offered in school restrooms. New York City, for example, saw an attendance increase of 2.4% amongst schoolgirls after schools in the state were required to provide menstrual hygiene products in restrooms for girls in grades 6 through 12.
Finally, both Canadian and international law include equality rights providing that all individuals are equal under the law and have equal protection of the law without discrimination.[8] The failure to make available free-of-charge menstrual hygiene products, while all the required materials necessary for non-menstruating individuals are provided, amounts to the undermining of such equality rights.[9] Some restrooms in Canada are required by law to have available toilet paper, soap, and hand drying facilities,[10] but there exists no similar requirement for the provision of menstrual hygiene products. Like toilet paper and soap for non-menstruators, menstrual hygiene materials are a necessity for menstruating individuals to be able to safely and effectively manage a normal bodily process. Accordingly, the failure to provide free-of-charge menstrual hygiene products amounts to discrimination on the basis of sex and undermines equality rights.
Menstruation is an inevitable and natural bodily process that half the population will experience. By denying menstruating individuals access to free-of-charge menstrual hygiene products in restrooms, their human and equality rights are undermined. Canada started to distinguish itself as an international leader in promoting effective MHM in 2015 when it lifted the tax. It is time to continue this commitment to human rights and equality by making menstrual hygiene products freely available in restrooms so that everyone’s menstrual hygiene needs can be met.
[1] See Marni Sommer & Murat Sahin, “Overcoming the Taboo: Advancing the Global Agenda for Menstrual Hygiene Management for Schoolgirls” (2013) 103:9 Am J Public Health 1556; Julie Hennegan, “Menstrual Hygiene Management and Human Rights: The Case for an Evidence-Based Approach” (2017) 4:3 Womens Reprod Health 212.
[2] Sarah House, Thérèse Mahon & Sue Cavill, “Menstrual Hygiene Matters: a resource for improving menstrual hygiene around the world” (2013) 21:41 Reproducive Health Matters 257.
[3] International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, 19 December 1976, 993 UNTS 3 Can TS 1976 No. 46, art. 12.
[4] CESCR, General Comment No. 14: Article 12 (The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health), 22nd Sess, adopted 11 August 2000, UN Doc E/C.12/2000/4.
[5] See Inga Winkler & Virginia Roaf, “Taking the Bloody Linen out of the Closet: Menstrual Hygiene as a Priority for Achieving Gender Equality” (2014) 21:1 Cardozo Journal of Law and Gender; Kasandra Brabaw, “The World Doesn’t Make Room For Menstruating Men”, Refinery21 (9 July 2018), online: <https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/trans-men-period-problems-non-binary-menstruation>; Geraldine Malone, “The Women Trying to Make Periods More Affordable in Northern Indigenous Communities”, Vice (28 February 2017), online: <https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/ez8g87/the-women-trying-to-make-periods-more-affordable-in-northern-indigenous-communities>.
[6] Universal Declaration of Human Rights, GA Res 217A (III), UNGAOR, 3rd Sess, Supp No 13, UN Doc A/810 (1948) at art. 21.1.
[7] Ibid at art. 26.1.
[8] Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Part 1 of the Constitution Act, 1982, being Schedule B to the Canada Act 1982 (UK), c 11, s 15.
[9] See Elizabeth Montano, “The Bring Your Own Tampon Policy: Why Menstrual Hygiene Products Should Be Provided for Free in Restrooms” (2018) 73 U. Miami L. Rev. 370.
[10] For example, restrooms in workplaces are required by occupational health and safety regulations to have toilet paper, soap, and hand drying facilities. See Canada Occupational Health and Safety Regulations, SOR/86-304 ss 9.16, 9.22(a), & 9.22(b).
