By Ravi Ramachandran
Menstruation is not a problem; poor menstrual hygiene is.
In a recent conversation with a gynaecologist, we learned that poor hygiene can leave a woman’s body vulnerable to health conditions that could affect her life. If ignored, gynaecologists say that women could be dealing with health conditions such as Hepatitis B, Urinary Tract Infections (UTIs) and cervical cancer more often than expected.
In our country, there is a widespread culture of silence on menstruation, despite 400 million menstruating women. According to studies conducted by Business Insider, DNA India and Dasra, over 71% of Indian girls are unaware of menstruation before they get it while 80% of women do not use pads. These numbers are staggering and require attention and conversation.
We’re incredibly busy with work, our family and our social lives. Often we are so preoccupied with our lives and its unpredictability that we forget to take care of ourselves and ignore our wellness in the process. Hence, there is a genuine need to address wellness – and more so for women.
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Emphasising the importance of menstrual hygiene in a woman’s life is an essential part of health and wellness. While there is information available to women about daily hygiene, it is important that we also realise the significance of Menstrual Hygiene Management (MHM) as an attempt to improve women’s overall health and wellness.
I thought I had an opportunity to solve this problem and that’s what inspired me to start Nua.
My approach was to build effective and meaningful products backed by creating awareness through trustworthy content, and providing for social, emotional and cultural support by creating a very strong community.
At Nua, our goal has always been to help solve real problems that women face – be it through innovative products, our impactful community of over 550,000 women, and a personalised experience with educational content playing a big role. What sets us apart is that we strongly believe we’re one of the few organisations out there that is approaching this holistically rather than just selling a product to a consumer.
We have applied the same philosophy to Project Prerna, our initiative to help women most affected by COVID-19 and also struck by period poverty. Our efforts began in 2018, when we partnered with CRY to organise menstrual hygiene workshops at a government school in Bangalore where we also supplied 10,000+ pads. Subsequently, as a part of the Kerala Flood Relief in 2019, we supplied 5,000+ sanitary pads to impacted women through the Indian Red Cross Society.
Journey with Project Prerna moved forward with the intention to pursue the areas where we, as an organisation, can have the greatest impact – low-income communities in containment zones in Mumbai. We partnered with The Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (BMC), YWater and Global Shapers Navi Mumbai hub (part of the World Economic Forum) in 2020. Along with our sanitary pads, we also provided pamphlets in Marathi and Hindi detailing usage instructions, hygiene and safe disposal practices.
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We were able to raise Rs. 22 lakhs in four weeks and provided 30,000 women in low-income neighbourhoods with Nua sanitary pads and menstrual hygiene kits in Mumbai and Maharashtra.
In 2021 when the pandemic was witnessing the lethal second wave, we joined hands with the Rotary Club of Bombay and Pride NGO to help women frontline health workers, including doctors, nurses and healthcare support staff. We supplied hospitals in Mumbai and Maharashtra with kits containing menstrual and personal hygiene products. We also managed to raise another Rs. 21 lakhs to support over 12,000 women with sanitary pads and menstrual hygiene kits in Bangalore and Osmanabad.
Since the launch of Project Prerna, we have distributed 4.5 lakh pads and kits to 50,000 women by raising over Rs. 40 lakhs.
Going forward, our vision is to support 1 million women in the upcoming years.
Like most start-ups, Nua’s journey has been exciting, interesting and has had its own challenges. However, for us, a sense of happiness comes from having thousands of our community members who either benefit from our product or appreciate the kind of content we put out there.
While the unfortunate reality is that most women in India still do not have access to menstrual products, each one of us can do our bit. With menstruators being vocal about their period struggles, educational content provided by professionals, the support of communication platforms and more, there’s no better time to start the conversation with the hope that each one takes it to the next level and eventually at a larger scale. For example, every woman can ensure that she has the conversation with younger girls in their lives so that they have the information they need to keep safe from susceptible conditions related to the lack of menstrual hygiene.
The space we want to solve for currently involves menstrual wellness – not just a period product but way beyond that. Even within menstrual wellness, we wish to address the related conditions associated with it, such as PMS symptoms, hormonal skin, and more. We want our solutions to be easy and convenient for women across the country.
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Women’s wellness needs go beyond just managing the blood flow. Most women have to deal with anxiety, stress, mood swings, and emotional strain, amongst other things, during their menstrual cycle, and they often worry about whether it’s normal. Furthermore, having access to safe and convenient facilities to manage and dispose of used menstrual materials without discomfort or fear is just as important. This is where Menstrual Hygiene Management plays a vital role in breaking the silence and building awareness about how good hygiene is a fundamental part of menstruation. And Nua, through its thriving community and initiatives like Project Prerna, is taking the right steps to create a holistic impact on a physical, emotional and societal level at large by providing support and helping women understand that they are not alone.
(Authored Article by Ravi Ramachandran CEO and Founder Nua )
