Ahmedabad: The state health department has re-scheduled the launch of menstrual hygiene project, this time from across the state.
Now, the revamped project will cover over 4 million women, including secondary school girls. This project will be inter-linked with recently launched ‘mission shakti’ program, a senior health department official said.
The environmental implications red-flagged by environmentalists predominantly over ‘disposal issues’ of sanitary napkins has led to a delay in launching the menstrual hygiene project from selected high priority districts scheduled last year, the official added.
However, the health department claims to have taken the delay into their stride as the focus of the health project that also covers education sector by aiming to bring down the drop-out rate among secondary school girls has been widened and also linked with ‘mission shakti’ project, The Indian Express reported.
“Earlier the plan was to launch this project from four or five selected districts where the female literacy rate was low and high female drop-out rates. As per the latest decision, this will be launched in all the 33 districts, simultaneously. Also, this project will be inter-linked with the recently launched ‘mission shakti’ programme to check high rate of anaemia among women. This month we are focussing on the menstrual hygiene project in a big way. It is expected to be launched soon,” confirmed health commissioner J P Gupta.
Apart from an increase in the target beneficiaries, another new aspect added into this project is the aggressive awareness campaigns to be launched soon.