Until a decade ago, many women across the country had absolutely no access to sanitary napkins and healthy menstrual health. Good news – the Indian government took an initiative to ensure that all women and girls, especially from the rural pockets, have access to sanitary napkins.
Perhaps, no one could foresee the magnitude of the harm it will cause. The convenient use of pads has silently given birth to menstrual pollution. Billions of pads make their way into landfills, water bodies, and sewerage systems, causing huge environmental and health risks.
And it is rising faster than we can imagine.
Most of the sanitary napkins available in the market contain chemicals and up to 90 percent plastic. These plastic, industrially-manufactured, disposable pads take about 500 to 800 years to decompose.
According to the Menstrual Hygiene Alliance of India…