By Matthew Petersen
Cape Town – Many adolescent girls in South Africa struggle with access to sanitary products and are not educated when it comes to female hygiene and how to deal with issues such as menstruation.
Many of these girls aren’t always able to get sanitary towels, tampons or pads regularly due to high costs. The Sunsets & Waterfalls Foundation (SWF) has donated over 500 sanitary towels to Bridgetown High School in Athlone and Capricorn Primary School in Muizenburg.
The SWF conducts school programs and tours across Cape Town where they distribute sanitary products and educate young girls on the importance of self-care.
Jackie Petersen, a friend of SWF, initiated the project with the objective of keeping girls in school in the underprivileged communities.
“I was once a girl and I cannot imagine the feeling of experiencing a menstrual period with a fresh sanitary towel. How does one focus at school or have to miss school because of the lack thereof,” she said. Petersen added that they had plans to distribute towels in areas such as Heathfield, Lavender Hill and Hanover Park too.
Romano Claasen, a teacher at Bridgetown High School said they were grateful to be benefitting from this experience.
“We are grateful to SWF for the time and efforts to helping the girls at Bridgetown. This will certainly help them and they are already looking forward to other initiatives.”
Cindy Jacobs, the co-founder of SWF said her team was grateful to each individual, team and investor that contributed with their donations to this initiative to help young girls stay in school.
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