Revista de Pesquisa e Desenvolvimento em Educação em Saúde

Improving Girl Child Education and Menstrual Hygiene through Free Sanitary Pad Provision to Secondary School Girls-opinion of Female University Students in Ghana

Abstract

Evans Paul Kwame Ameade and Saeed Folorunsho Majeed

Absence of appropriate sanitary materials to absorb menstrual flow does not only affect female’s reproductive health but their acquisition of education. The government of Ghana is proposing provision of free disposable sanitary pads to assist brilliant but poor school girls remain in school. This study assessed female university students in northern Ghana’s opinion on this policy and factors that would influence their opinions. To achieve these objective data was collected in a cross-sectional study after administering a questionnaire to 293 randomly selected students. The data was analyzed and association between the various variable were tested using Graph Pad 5.01. The study showed that 78.2% of respondents used disposable sanitary pads during their first year of menstruation with the rest using toilet tissue and re-useable cloth. Majority, 53.2% of respondents agreed with the free sanitary pad policy with their main reason for the support being the high cost of disposable sanitary pads. For the minority, 27.0% who opposed the policy, their reasons include unsustainability, being a misplaced priority and that it is the responsibility of parents to provide sanitary pads for their children. Followers of Islam were significantly more supportive of the free sanitary pad policy than Christians (p=0.003).