DHAKA: Almost 80 percent of the women in Bangladesh do not use sanitary napkins mainly due to its high cost and also a lack of awareness, leaving them susceptible to a myriad of health problems, a media report said on Sunday.
In 2014, about 14 percent of women used napkins. Now, the percentage is about 20 percent, The Daily Star newspaper said in the report citing industry insiders as saying.
In Bangladesh, the average price of a high-quality sanitary napkin 12 taka.
“Many people think it is an extra cost but they do not realize the health cost of traditional management of menstrual cycles,” said Sharmind Neelormi, a professor at Jahangirnagar University.
Naima Sultana, a student at the University of Dhaka, said that women still feel shy about buying pads from shops, adding that awareness on the importance of sanitary napkins was seriously lacking.
Mamunur Rahman, a founder of Ella Pad, a low-cost sanitary napkin, said: “But people don’t want to talk about the subject due to social taboo.”
“Our first-generation women are still advising their descendants to use cloth instead of sanitary napkins,” Rahman said while calling for large scale awareness programs to get women to embrace sanitary napkins.
But Jesmin Zaman, head of marketing of Square Toiletries, said the price was not the main deterrent for women using sanitary napkins.
“A woman needs only 50 takas to manage a menstrual cycle. This is not too high as they spend more on cosmetics. Habit, awareness, and price are the three reasons behind the low penetration,” The Daily Star quoted Zaman as saying
In an effort to remove the social taboo and create awareness, Square has trained and briefed at least 50 lakh, school-going girls, in the last 10 years about the management of menstrual issues, she said, adding they also operate a toll-free teleservice where any female can get free advice from professionals.
(with inputs from Agencies)
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