No period drama with Lifetime

Lifetime (DStv channel 131), in partnership with South African based NGO Ashraful Aid, has launched a project aimed at helping ease the burden of period poverty experienced by thousands of women and schoolgirls across South Africa.

“Sanitary products are expensive, and due to the high rate of poverty in our country thousands of young women suffer extensively every month and many girls are forced to stay home from school simply because they cannot afford sanitary products. Through this campaign, for the price of a snack, you can help a girl child ensure that her schooling doesn’t have to stop when her period starts,” explains Nazarene Khan, Regional Manager of A+E Networks Africa.

Each period hygiene box costs just R50 and contains sanitary pads, a bar of soap, a facecloth, hand sanitiser, wet wipes, a face mask, and underarm roll-on.

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“Women and schoolgirls have always been subjected to structural disadvantages in society and these have been exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic. The items in the sanitary packs are essential to the health and wellbeing of vulnerable women and girls and will undoubtedly help ease the burden of period poverty,” says Ashraful Aid Executive Director, Suhail Wadee.

All funds raised will go towards the period hygiene boxes which will be distributed to underprivileged women and girls who cannot afford sanitary products.

Lifetime, a vibrant female-focused entertainment channel, doesn’t include period dramas as part of its programming line-up. In keeping with the channel’s innate edginess, Lifetime has taken a creative approach to the very serious issue of period poverty by playing on the words ‘Lifetime doesn’t do period drama, and neither should our schoolgirls’. It is hoped that this original campaign will destigmatise conversations around periods.