Menstruation poverty in Polish refugee camps

Civitas on Air

Menstrual poverty is on the rise among displaced women who have been forced to live outside of their home countries as a result of war and economic poverty experience even worse menstrual health conditions. In a report by UNICEF (2019), displaced women face various challenging hygienic conditions while living in the camps due to lack of adequate and accessible facilities that support menstrual hygiene for women and young girls. As reported by Concern Worldwide (2018), Syrian refugee women living in Lebanon often prioritise their demand for basic human needs such as food and shelter because they considered these issues as the means of survival while living the camps and as result, menstrual hygiene is not valued as the main issue they need at the time of stay in the host country. In addition, menstrual hygiene in these camps is often unattainable due to long lines to the toilet, no privacy to the toilet doors as they are usually without locks, and unhygienic toilet-water shortages and experienced sexual and gender-based violence.

Menstrual health and hygiene management should be treated as a social -economic problem with the implication for sustainable health and environment action. Pilot study by Dr, Omoye Akhagba aims to find out the living conditions of refugees in the Polish camps and how they maintain their menstrual hygiene while these camps.

Listen to our podcast with Dr. Omoye Akhagba, hosted by a Collegium Civitas student, Khushi Dhomne.

Omoye Mary Akhagba holds a doctorate degree in Sociology from the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland (IFIS, PAN). Her doctoral research focused on the social and cultural aspect of cervical cancer screening among Nigerian women living in Poland. She also holds a master’s degree in media, Culture and Society from Graduate School for Social Research at the Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland.