Access to free menstrual products is becoming more prominent at the University of Florida, with “period packs” popping up in many bathrooms.
Planned Parenthood Generation Action at UF has begun their campaign to supply bathrooms at the university with a box of free menstrual products, named period packs, for anyone in need.
UF senior Sabrina Briceno has been involved in Generation Action for three years. After serving as resident and vice president, she is now campus campaign committee chair for the organization. Every chapter has a campus campaign, she said, and for the past three years it has been decreasing period poverty by increasing access to menstrual products.
“One of my committee members put it perfectly: It frustrates us that there has to be a committee that provides menstrual products and refills them in the same way that there isn’t a toilet paper committee,” she said. “There’s no toilet paper committee on campus making sure that students have access to toilet paper, and we see toilet paper as menstrual products, as one in the same. So, it’s the same necessity – that’s how we see it.”