By Okechukwu Onuegbu
Stakeholders in Anambra State, Friday, former a coalition and unveiled an advocacy roadmap to improve policy adoption on menstrual health and hygiene across the State.
They spoke at a workshop on the adoption of the National Menstrual Health and Hygiene Management (MHHM) Policy in Anambra State, an event organised by Development Centre for Orientation, Discovery and Empowerment (DeCODE) through its Menstrual Ease for Girls (ME4Girls) Project funded by Rise Up Together.
The policy, aimed at domestication of the National Menstrual Health and Hygiene Management Policy in Anambra State, sought collaboration among the Ministries of Education, Health, and Women Affairs and Social Welfare, including civil society organisations, media and development partners to promote coordinated implementation.
The Executive Director, DeCODE, Cynthia Enweonwu-Arinze had in a presentation highlighted findings and recommendations from the ME4Girls situation assessment, which among other things included absenteeism of menstrual knowledge in public schools, inconsistent menstrual health education, pain management, and identifiable institutional gaps.
The participants lamented over the current menstrual health situation in Anambra State, marshalled out priority actions required for policy adoption and implementation, which included establishment of the Anambra Menstrual Health Advocacy Coalition to coordinate advocacy, stakeholder engagement, and policy implementation, and submission of a draft implementation framework for public Secondary Schools.
They advocated for the integration of menstrual health education, gender-responsive WASH facilities, and school support systems into public secondary schools across the State, while encouraging government to develop and adopt an implementation framework for menstrual health, promote evidence-based planning, monitoring, research, and accountability to strengthen menstrual health programming.
According to a communiqué issued at the end of the programme, participants pledged commitment towards improved advocacy for policy adoption within their respective institutions, to collaborate with others and embark on increase awareness campaigns for its successful actualisation.