In Muhuru Bay, girls have to make difficult choices. Economic insecurity can cause students to choose between buying sanitary products, or meeting other essential needs. This keeps girls out of school while they are menstruating--falling behind in classrooms where social barriers already hold them back. Some students use transactional sex to gain funding, which harms both their physical and mental health. WISER provides free products and SRH education to support health and keep girls in school.
Globally, girls have lower access to education due to lack of menstrual hygiene products and clean water to wash. For poor families, helping their daughters manage menstruation can take a backseat to light, food, housing, or even educating their sons. Girls often have to choose between unsanitary methods to manage their menstrual health, which can increase the risk of infection and HIV, or staying home from school, remaining uneducated and poor. Some girls trade sex for money to buy pads.
WISER provides free menstrual hygiene products, as well as comprehensive healthcare services. WISER also has an expansive sexual and reproductive health curriculum that includes non-stigmatizing discussions of menstrual health. At WISER, girls have both the tools to manage their monthly cycles and an environment that normalizes conversations about them. WISER also provides choices in how girls manage their menstrual health, including reusable pads and menstrual cups, as well as clean water.
240 WISER girls will be in the classroom getting an education and a subsequent job that can get them and their families out of poverty. Girls in the wider community will be provided with sexual and reproductive health education. Hygienic menstrual management reduces the risk of infections and urogenital damage. The reduction in the need for transactional sex reduces opportunities for abuse, child pregnancy, STIs and HIV infection.
This project has provided additional documentation in a PDF file (projdoc.pdf).
Support this important cause by creating a personalized fundraising page.
Start a Fundraiser
