“Menstruating monthly is not an illness,” says Sumithra Randenigala, who works as a security guard in Sri Lanka’s largest city, Colombo. But when she has her monthly period, the 26-year-old often calls in sick to work.
Getting her pay docked some days each month is a better alternative than being unable to use the toilet during the two-hour daily train commute from her sleepy seaside town Bentota to Colombo Fort Station.
“If I need to change my pad, the toilet on the train is locked or blocked. At work, guards aren’t allowed to use the office toilet,” she tells me at the Sri Lanka Tea Board, where she works.
She attended school till age 14, where she learnt about urinary tract infections in class. She knows the importance of changing her sanitary pad frequently. After several painful experiences of contracting UTIs, she now chooses to forfeit her daily pay sometimes, rather than risk an infection that would force her to take a week of unpaid sick leave.
What are the options for Sumithra and others like her who come into Colombo daily to work?
Women’s needs
Limited access to toilets affects women disproportionately. Women in the workforce are usually of reproductive age, needing to navigate monthly menstrual periods and/or pregnancies during these...