Missed Opportunities: Menstruation Matters for Family Planning
Julie Hennegan1, Amy O Tsui2, Marni Sommer3
1Research Associate, The Water Institute, Department of Environmental Health and Engineering, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA, jhenneg1@jhu.edu.
Abstract:
Increased global attention is being paid to the importance of adolescent and adult women's experiences of menstruation in low- and middle-income countries, and the challenges these experiences present to health, education and gender equality. Although much of the focus has been on menarche as a window of opportunity for early engagement in young women's sexual and reproductive health, minimal attention has been paid to the natural linkages between menstrual health and hygiene and females' management of reproduction over their life course.
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