'Pyramid of feminine hygiene products' collected at United Way Tampon Tuesday

United Way of the Lower Mainland says for low-income and homeless women, having aperiodcan mean another financial burden.

They tried to lessen that burden with a new campaign for the Lower Mainland called Tampon Tuesday, which soughtdonations of tampons and other supplies for women in need.

"Our goal is to raise an issue there's a lot of stigma around, we don't really talk about a lot, but is impacting women in our community," Nikki Hill, a director with the United Way, told On The Coast guest host Gloria Macarenko.

"It has resulted in what we're calling the 'pyramid of feminine hygiene products' in the United Way lobby here. The diverse support from the community was so great."

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Hill says the first Tampon Tuesday was held in London, Ontario, a few years ago after they looked through a food bank's non-food donation section and found almost no feminine hygiene products.

That inspired a hygiene product driveso successful, it has since become a regular event in that city.

Forgotten 'detail' of poverty

Hill says access to feminine hygiene products is a matter of dignity, and an inability to get them is a "detail" of poverty many people don't think of.

"We find when we askcompanies to put together hampers for United Way for different causes, this is one product that is consistently left off the list," she said.

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She says for some women in poverty, weighing access to food or hygiene products is a decision that has to be weighed.

But she also believes recent political discourse, includingthe ending of hygiene products being taxable by GST, has started a conversation and she says it might eventually lead to making hygiene products free.

"Affordability challenges in the Lower Mainland, we're always talking about them, how does that impact the ability to access hygiene products and food for people in our community?"

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Tampon Tuesday, which featured participation fromunions, labour groups and community groups, was also an opportunity for the United Way to call for a poverty reduction plan and for $10-a-day child care in B.C.

With files from CBC Radio One's On The Coast

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