“Tampax compak is so discrete,
only you’ll know it’s a tampon.”
Menstrual products are such a big secret!
Wait, men! Don’t skip this!
Periods concern all of us -- and the environment.
And because we hardly ever talk about it, this is what has happened.
Billions of pads and tampons end up in the environment each year.
Some of which are made almost entirely of plastic!
Big companies continue to profit off our silence...
The good news is: We have solutions –
that are both eco-friendly and cheap!
But hardly anybody is using them.
Chances are, you haven’t even heard of some.
So why is the solution to such a big problem still so unknown?
Menstrual products are more than just girly things we don’t talk about.
Placing them at the centre actually reveals a lot about the modern world.
Let’s start with the menstrual cup.
It seems brand new,
but it has actually been around for – wait for it – over a hundred years!
If you didn’t know that, that’s not on you.
We actually know surprisingly little about how
women dealt with their ‘monthly visitor’ through history.
What we do know is that no society has ever really viewed menstruation very positively.
“Peggy, of course I can’t go swimming. You know I’ve got the curse.”
Most women used what was locally available to them
– like old cloth, or even dried plants and leaves
and sometimes even mud.
I can’t imagine how uncomfortable that must have been.
Not to mention impractical.
Around the time the lightbulb was invented,
the first ideas for the modern cup were born.
Around 200 people filed patents for similar
blood-capturing devices: from belts, sacks, to suspenders…
and aprons… and girdles.
As women entered the workforce
and mass-production began, the more practical inventions –
pads, cups and tampons -- entered the market
and they were a hit!
For the first time, women were able work and swim alongside men at any time of the month.
“Yeah, I mean, it is liberating in a very sort of physical way.”
Sharra Vostral has written two books on menstruation through the ages.
She says though that even with such inventions, it was only the rich,
Western people who had access.
And period poverty is still a huge problem worldwide.
The pad became the elite’s top choice at the time,
seen as the ‘safe option’ by those too squeamish to imagine
their wives and daughters
inserting things into their bodies.
Some feared that they would lose their virginity.
This hasn’t changed much. Pads are still used more than any other product.
They have the greatest environmental impact as well – but more on that later.
The old tampons and cups were being quickly
outcompeted by the mid-20th century.
“Especially during World War II it never quite got off the ground.
Partly that was due to a rubber shortage and rations put on rubber.
So the idea of using rubber for menstrual cups, it just wasn't
an economic imperative.
During World War II, rubber was supposed to go toward tires
and things that soldiers needed, not women's bodies.”
The cup had a bigger disadvantage.
The way it works is that when you have your period, you insert it
and then remove it in 6-12 hours
to empty and clean to sanitise correctly.
One cup can be used for up to 10 years.
That’s sustainable – but it means that far fewer cups are sold.
The first company to sell mass-produced cups soon went out of business.
“It wasn't that women didn't want the product.
When they closed, they got letters back to them saying, can I get, you know, ten cups, I need my cups.”
So while the cup got elbowed out, pads got better –
with adhesive wings and plastic absorbents instead of cotton.
And with a generational shift and the sexual revolution,
tampons gained acceptance in the West too.
By the 1970s, about 70% of U.S. women used them.
Correspondingly, tampons and pads began filling up bins and landfills.
So in the early 2000s, the cup re-launched – with a new environmental agenda.
Silicone replaced rubber.
"It's our most breathable top sheet ever!"
But pad and tampon makers had their claws in too deep.
And the image of periods had been so sanitized
that it was hard to imagine touching, cleaning, and reusing
something that had come into contact with seemingly shameful menstrual blood.
“Our bodies have a lot of things that we excrete, right?
Whether it's earwax or blowing your nose or whatever.
But we don't judge it the same way. You're just not going to lose social standing
because of your earwax, but if you are leaking places,
are not managing your period away – whatever social mores [there] are for it,
then there is retribution about that.”
Thanks to the shame and advertising, countless tons of sanitary products are now
thrown away each year – leaking chemicals and microplastics into the air, land, and sea.
This shame may be most apparent in Asia’s patriarchal cultures – where menstruating women
are still seen as ‘impure’.
“It was the pad manufacturers who in mid 1980s realized that the LMICs,
which is the low and middle income countries,
had the biggest market.
85 % of the world's menstruators live in low and middle income countries.”
Gender scholar Supriya Garikipati says about 80% of people who menstruate in India
have no access to sanitary products –
so the market is very attractive.
The government is working to improve access as well and promotes unsustainable pads –
which now nearly overwhelm the market.
“I think the intention was good, right?
The intention was truly to support women from low income households,
manage their menstrual hygiene.
So it decided to do the easy thing and to free ride on existing knowledge,
on existing competence, and on free-riding on the advertising
marketing machinery of pad manufacturers.”
Distributing single-use pads is like giving
someone plastic or paper plates for regular meals
instead of a dinner plate:
using public money, transporting them around the country,
using resources, paying for labor,
and filling up dumps –
with plastic and toxins within these products.
“The singular narrative around sanitary pads can be broken. The important point
is give women the choice. Let them decide what is right for them.”
So let’s take a look at our options then –
that differ based on budget, accessibility
and their effect on the environment.
First up – the famous sanitary pad!
It’s the most easily accessible around the world, and the most
difficult to get rid of.
The pad can be up to 90 percent plastic – from the permeable surface to the core’s superabsorbent
polymers that swell with blood.
They’re easy to use and throw away.
But with inadequate waste disposal systems around the world, pads most likely end up in the great outdoors.
Over an average of 40 years of menstruation, people spend up
to $5000 on pads.
Next up is the tampon.
Those with applicators have an extra layer of largely single-use plastic.
But it’s not just the applicator. The tampon itself is made of several layers of plastic.
From the layer that holds it all
together to the absorbent core.
And often the string is made of plastic as well.
They do contain less plastic than pads overall.
Tampons can also be organic, which means they are only made of cotton.
Which is better. But recycling them or disposing of them is really difficult.
People can spend around $2000 on tampons over a lifetime.
Period pants have recently become more popular in the West.
They have two layers: an external, resistant one of plastic or natural fiber to prevent leaks.
And a super absorbent fabric one close to the skin.
They can be worn for up to two years – but as with
any other reusable, washing them takes time and effort.
The reusable making a strong comeback is the cup.
It can take a lot of getting used to –
and access to running water is absolutely essential
for convenience and hygiene. But interest is growing.
Reusables can cost more up front, which is a big
problem for people without disposable income –
but add up to fraction over a lifetime.
Environmentally-speaking, one cup can replace
around 20 single-use pads or tampons per cycle.
That’s about 250 a year.
And over a lifetime, just four cups can
replace up to 10,000 single-use products.
“Just even destigmatizing menstruation and making it normal,
just having it be a regular part of conversation, is a different way of being.
And I think that can be radical in its own way.”
Relying on companies for information has led to the reinforcement of the stigma and shame around periods.
And pollution.
So what we need now is less shame –
and more awareness and access to choices that are better on the pocket and the environment.
The cup is just one idea for sustainability – we have many more on our channel.
Don’t forget to check them out!