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SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah Period Project has successfully made menstrual products available in places like many public K-12 schools and schools of higher education.
The next goal is to make the products available in the workplace.
"It's kind of the one forgotten bathroom need, something that is so essential to 50% of our population and yet has never been present in our bathrooms," said Emily Bell McCormick, founder and president of The Policy Project.
The Policy Project is home to the Utah Period Project.
For women, it may seem like a no-brainer to have menstrual products available in the workplace, but the nonprofit organization Utah Policy Project said more businesses need to start offering them.
"Half of women who are living in poverty have to choose on the monthly, between purchasing period products and purchasing a meal from their family," Bell McCormick said. "If you have kids, if you have a family, you know the choices that those women are making."
On Wednesday, Utah business executives and leaders learned more about the importance and benefits of providing period products to employees. The initiative hopes to redefine the 21st-century bathroom to include not only things like toilet paper, soap, and paper towels but period products as well.
Bell McCormick said, "Addressing basic menstrual needs is probably the one way, the most easy and least expensive way, that you can create and invest in gender equality and inclusion in workplaces."
