Period poverty: African women priced out of buying sanitary pads

Source: BBC

Period poverty: African women priced out of buying sanitary pads

11 August 2023

By Esther Ogola, Gem O'Reilly & Favour Nunoo
BBC News, Nairobi, London & Accra

Women on the minimum wage in Ghana have to spend one in every seven dollars they earn on sanitary pads, research by the BBC has found.

The BBC surveyed nine countries around Africa to see how affordable period products are. We compared the minimum wage to the local cost of the cheapest sanitary pads and found they were beyond the reach of many women.

While Ghana was the country with the least affordable menstrual products of those we surveyed, women across Africa are struggling with "period poverty" - something activists are trying to change.

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However, after the government increased taxes on sanitary products, a packet of pads now costs 20 cedis, pushing them out of her reach.

The price rises caused women to protest outside Ghana's parliament in June 2023.

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Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-66423981


Women have been protesting in Ghana and other countries for change (Toko Masemola/change.org)