ウィーン、薬局で生理用品を無償提供

【ウィーンＡＦＰ＝時事】オーストリアの首都ウィーンで１１日、「生理の貧困」対策で、ドラッグストアで生理用品を無償で提供するプログラムが開始した。（写真は生理用品。オーストリア・ウィーンのドラッグストアで）
　生理用ナプキンやタンポンなどが必要に応じて無償提供される。貧困層の女性１万５０００人が対象となる。
　社民党のカトリン・ガール副市長は、生理用品の入手は基本的ニーズだとし、「いかなる状況においても、金銭の問題になってはならない」と説明した。
　ウィーン女性保健当局はＡＦＰに、生理用品の引換券は本当に必要な人を対象に青少年センターやフードバンクなど約８０施設で配布されると述べた。
　生理の貧困とは、女性がお金がないためタンポンなどの生理用品を入手できない状況を指す。
　研究によると、女性が生涯で使用するタンポンや生理用ナプキンは約１万７０００個で、その費用は総額３０００ユーロ（約４７万円）に上る。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2023/10/12-16:57）

Austria's capital Vienna on Wednesday rolled out a programme to combat period poverty with drugstores offering free sanitary products to disadvantaged women.
In 2020, Scotland became the first country in the world to sign free universal access to period products in public buildings into law.
Starting from this week, 15,000 disadvantaged girls and women in Vienna can each get a free packet of sanitary pads or tampons at a drugstore chain for their monthly period needs.
Access to period products is a basic need, said Vienna's Social Democrats deputy mayor Kathrin Gaal. They should under no circumstances be a question of money.
Vouchers for the packets will be distributed in the city's approximately 80 youth centres and food banks to target those really in need, Kristina Hametner, head of the Vienna office for women's health, told AFP.
The Red Box programme follows a successful pilot scheme in the capital's underprivileged Brigittenau district in 2021.
Under the three-month scheme, 80,000 tampons and 95,000 sanitary pads were made available in Brigittenau, where about 20 percent of women are at risk of poverty.
Period poverty occurs when women and girls lack the money for tampons, pads or other sanitary products.
Studies suggest that a woman needs approximately 17,000 tampons or pads on average throughout her life, with costs amounting to about 3,000 euros.
Globally, campaigners say the issue has a direct effect on girls' education, with a knock-on impact on work opportunities, thus deepening gender inequality.