Last week’s federal budget committed A$12.5 million over 4 years to deliver tampons, pads and other period care products to individuals who menstruate in rural and distant Indigenous communities.
The provision of those products might be coordinated by the National Aboriginal Community-Controlled Health Organisation (NACCHO), the height body for Indigenous-controlled health clinics in Australia. These clinics are sometimes highly trusted and well-attended by people in rural and distant Indigenous communities as a consequence of their culturally sensitive and holistic approaches to health and wellbeing.
This move follows financial support for menstrual products more broadly over the past few years, including the availability of free period products in public schools across all Australian states and territories.
But individuals who menstruate in rural and distant Indigenous communities face a singular set of challenges, and have a specific need for higher access to period products.
Menstruation in Indigenous communities
One of us (Minnie King) is an Indigenous woman. I actually have seen members of my family and community challenged at times during menstruation by an absence of period products, in consequence of low availability and alternative, and high cost. I’ve also witnessed limited knowledge amongst young people of their changing bodies.
All of those issues are exacerbated by remoteness, which increases costs and reduces access to services.
fornStudio/Shutterstock
To open a positive discussion of this natural cycle, the 2 of us, along with other colleagues, have been involved in a research project on menstrual health in Indigenous communities. We spoke to students and girls in these communities in regards to the challenges they face in managing their periods.
Participants have told us about being unable to store period products of their crowded homes, and of other barriers to accessing and using period products, equivalent to cost. In many cases this has meant using alternatives equivalent to wads of bathroom paper or cut up clothing.
Reusable products
The advent of reusable period care products previously decade, including reusable cups, underwear and pads, has offered more options for individuals who menstruate. Quality products can wash and wear for as much as ten years. In essence, this implies they’re “inflation-proof”.
Participants in our research talked about not knowing about or having the ability to purchase reusable options equivalent to pads, cups and underwear.
Our work has distributed each single-use and reusable period care products to individuals who menstruate in distant Indigenous communities.
When school students in distant Western Cape York trialled reusable period underwear and pads, they told us these products were discreet to wear. They also saw benefits equivalent to the actual fact reusable products remove the necessity for waste disposal (with each convenience and environmental advantages), are cheaper over the long run, and may all the time be available.
These findings suggest NACCHO may need to supply reusable in addition to single-use period products with the budget funding.
Why the budget announcement is required
Too often, distant and Indigenous voices will not be heard by decision-makers. The specific menstruation challenges and costs these people face are prone to be unfamiliar to those living in cities or financially privileged settings.
We were subsequently very happy to see funding within the budget to supply free menstrual products in these communities.
Author provided (no reuse)
Yet this doesn’t resolve the numerous associated issues affecting menstrual health in distant Indigenous communities, equivalent to the necessity for culturally targeted and timely education about menstrual health. This is a chance for community-led efforts.
We are currently writing a free teaching guide on menstrual health based on distant and Indigenous students’ views and requests for what they would love to know. This includes information in regards to the types, use, availability and disposal of period care products. It also includes information in regards to the biological reasons for periods and ways in which local students have shared to administer the challenges of mood swings and discomfort.
Our teaching guide will augment the prevailing, non-Indigenous and minimal period education that exists within the Australian curriculum. It might be released later this 12 months.
A step towards ‘period parity’
Providing free menstrual products through NACCHO in distant and rural Indigenous communities is pertinent to the primary end result within the broader goal of the National Agreement on Closing the Gap in Indigenous inequity: that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people enjoy long and healthy lives.
Appropriate period care products can enable girls, women and other individuals who menstruate to participate at school, work, family and recreation, whatever day of the month.
The budget funding for period products through the community-oriented networks of NACCHO supports our aspiration for menstrual health equity, or “period parity”, for all.
