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Breaking the silence around menstrual hygiene management Menstruation has always remained a silent topic in Pakistan due to cultural constraints. As a result, the needs of women, especially in regard to sanitation, have never been brought to the forefront. No relevant ministry from the Government of Pakistan has included Menstrual Hygiene Management (MHM) in their mandate. Therefore, UN-Habitat incorporated MHM not only as a component in its WASH projects, but also established the first-ever ‘MHM Working Group Pakistan’ with other humanitarian partners to advocate for better MHM policies and facilities to improve the lives of those who menstruate. The members of this unique group were aware that advocacy for MHM can only be undertaken in a unified manner. In 2015, the group made a breakthrough by celebrating the International Menstrual Hygiene Day and organized a dialogue between experts and public. It was the first-ever mainstream event where government representatives, medical experts, national assembly representatives, and humanitarian experts announced the formation of the group and recognized problems associated with MHM. In the latter half of the year,
UN-Habitat took World Toilet Day 2015 as an opportunity to flag the MHM agenda and through collaboration with the international Urgent Run campaign, UN-Habitat held Advocacy Walks throughout Pakistan for better sanitation and MHM facilities, reaching twitter impressions above 12 million and trending in Pakistan. Further, a symposium was organized in December 2015, with the objective to gather relevant Government ministries and experts to help devise the vision and key strategies to break the silence around MHM in Pakistan. The #MHMPakistan social media campaign reached over 10 million twitter impressions and became one of the ten most talked about topics on the day in the country. The conventional media, however, still remained reluctant in addressing the topic directly. To build on the efforts, in May 2016, UN-Habitat assumed the role of
advocating for MHM by managing the media and communications for the Menstrual Hygiene Day 2016. Under the umbrella of Ministry of Climate Change Pakistan, the event was celebrated at the Pakistan Institute of Parliamentary Services and was chaired by Ms. Romina Khurshid Alam, Media Coordinator Young Parliamentary Forum, Member National Assembly, and Member SDGs Taskforce while the panelists included Government representatives from across country. #MHMPakistan not only became a Top Twitter Trend in Pakistan but was also widely covered in all leading newspapers of the country, highlighting the positive change in media’s receptiveness towards menstruation related topics in Pakistan.
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