When Culture Closes Its Eyes: The Menstrual Hygiene Gap.
When Culture Closes Its Eyes: The Menstrual Hygiene Gap. In Kajiado County, culture speaks loudly on many things, marriage, livestock, land, and respect. But on menstruation, culture chooses silence. That silence is not neutral. It is active, powerful, and damaging. Girls are taught from a young age that bleeding makes them unclean. They are forbidden from touching food, entering kitchens, drawing water, or even sitting with family during their periods. In many homes, they are separated and made to sleep in small, poorly ventilated huts until their bleeding stops. These practices are defended as tradition, but tradition has never explained why a girl must be isolated while given nothing clean to use. The result is devastating: girls use rags, cow dung, leaves, or even ash to manage their flow. They develop infections that go untreated because no one is allowed to speak of them. They miss school for days every month, fall behind, and eventually drop out. And because no one talks, no one...