2月14日，一条＃妇联支援一线女医务人员卫生用品＃的新闻登上热搜，让大众看到了将疫情中，一线女医务人员对于卫生用品的需求问题。
这一问题最初由博主@梁钰Stacey提出，从被人忽视，到小范围的讨论，最后扩散为一场浩浩荡荡的“捐卫生巾”运动。
据中国妇女报统计，截止2月9日，全国有19800名左右医护人员前往武汉救援。其中护士约14000人，近90%是女性。
前段时间，我们忙着捐口罩，捐防护服，捐护目镜，基本没人考虑到女性医护人员生理期的基本需求！
卫生巾，安心裤等也无法被纳入救灾物的种类中，导致一线女性卫生用品存在巨大的缺口。
@梁钰stacey和她的志愿者团队在早期联系医院进行捐助的时候，还意想不到地遭受到了医院领导层的回绝：“这个不急。”
可实际的情况，那家医院有1300个女性医务人员，她们非常需要卫生巾和安全裤。
而在这件事发酵之时，网络上依然有人说风凉话，认为这件事并不重要。
可是，卫生巾事关乎女性健康的必要需求，并不是无关紧要的事物。对战斗在抗疫一线的女性医务工作者来说，原本应该是必需品的物资，却需要不断地申诉和发声才能被听见。
这被忽视的基本需求背后隐藏的，其实是我们文化中很少被提及的“月经羞耻”（Period-Shaming）。
我们用“老朋友”、“那个”、“大姨妈”等各种各样如暗号般的称呼来代替“月经”这一词；
买卫生巾时，小超市的阿姨会“好心”地用黑色/不透明塑料袋将它们包起来；
课间换卫生巾时我们会遮遮掩掩，偷偷摸摸地迅速塞入口袋防止别人看见；
在成长的过程中甚至还会因来月经和使用卫生巾被嘲笑；
明明是再正常不过的东西，却好像不好意思直接说出口，这些都是月经羞耻的一部分。
人们假装他不存在，默认它会悄悄被搞定，潜意识里觉得：别把“这种”事摆到台面上来。
这一现象，在许多地区更加严重，甚至会直接影响到女性的一生。
全世界有4000万女性正在遭受月经贫困。阻碍贫困地区女性上学的一大因素就是月经，许多贫困生来了月经后就要辍学。
据统计，一个女性一生中至少有2500天处于经期，要使用约一万片卫生巾。
想象一下，如果贫困女性无法承担一万片卫生巾的开支，那么意味着她们的一生要有累计七年的时间无法正常工作或学习，直接导致她们无法和男性平等竞争。
而在印度，因缺乏生理卫生知识，加上卫生用品价格高昂，许多女性不得不使用旧衣服或布条。据印度的一份全国调查报告，印度16-24岁的年轻女性中，约有60%无法用上卫生巾。
为了改变这一现状，印度女作家Aditi Gupta（阿迪蒂·古普塔）与丈夫共同创立了《月经》漫画，并一直致力于打破这种“月经禁忌”这种迂腐的束缚，今天我们来看看她在TED上对于这一话题的演讲——
Periods. Blood. Menstruation. Gross. Secret. Hidden. Why?
例假出血，月经，不雅，秘密，遮掩，为什么会这样呢？
A natural biological process that every girl and woman goes through every month for about half of her life. A phenomenon that is so significant that the survival and propagation of our species depends on it. Yet we consider it a taboo. We feel awkward and shameful talking about it.
作为一种自然的生理规律，每个女孩和妇女在其一生中，有一半的时间，每个月都会经历例假，这个现象如此重要，以至于全人类的生存，和繁衍都要依赖于它，然而我们却视它为禁忌，我们谈论它时感到尴尬和羞耻。
When I got my first periods, I was told to keep it a secret from others -- even from my father and brother.Later when this chapter appeared in our textbooks, our biology teacher skipped the subject.
我第一次来例假时，别人告诉我，不要将这件事告诉任何人，哪怕是爸爸和哥哥，后来在教科书上，出现了有关例假的章节，但是生物老师直接跳过了内容。
You know what I learned from it? I learned that it is really shameful to talk about it. I learned to be ashamed of my body. I learned to stay unaware of periods in order to stay decent.
你知道我学到了什么吗，我学到了谈论例假，是非常羞耻的事，我学到了为自己的身体感到羞耻，我学到了为了保持体面就得，假装不知道例假这件事。
Research in various parts of India shows that three out of every 10 girls are not aware of menstruation at the time of their first periods. And in some parts of Rajasthan this number is as high as nine out of 10 girls being unaware of it. You'd be surprised to know that most of the girls that I have spoken to, who did not know about periods at the time of their first menstruation thought that they have got blood cancer and they're going to die soon.
印度各地的调查显示，十分之三的女孩第一次来例假时，并不了解它，在拉贾斯坦邦的一些地区，这一比例高达十分之九，你可能会感到惊讶，大多数我接触过的女孩，在第一次来例假时，不知道例假是什么，她们以为她们得了血癌，马上就要死了。
Menstrual hygiene is a very important risk factor for reproductive tract infections. But in India, only 12 percent of girls and women have access to hygienic ways of managing their periods. If you do the math, 88 percent of girls and women use unhygienic ways to manage their periods.
经期卫生是导致女性生殖道感染，的重要风险因素，但在印度，只有12%的女孩和妇女，拥有卫生的例假处理方式，换句话说，88%的女孩和妇女，处理例假的方式都不卫生。
I was one of them. I grew up in a small town called Garhwa, in Jharkhand, where even buying a sanitary napkin is considered shameful. So when I started getting my periods, I began with using rags. After every use I would wash and reuse them. But to store them, I would hide and keep it in a dark, damp place so that nobody finds out that I'm menstruating. Due to repeated washing the rags would become coarse, and I would often get rashes and infections using them.
我就是其中之一，我在拉贾斯坦邦的，一个叫做加瓦的小镇长大，在那里甚至买卫生棉都很丢脸，所以当我来例假的时候，使用的都是布条，使用完我会清洗再利用，但是我得，找一个阴暗潮湿的地方把它藏起来，这样就没人知道我在生理期了，因为反复清洗布条变得粗糙，我常常得皮疹和感染。
I wore these already for five years until I moved out of that town. Another issue that periods brought in my lifethose of the social restrictions that are imposed upon our girls and women when they're on their periods. I think you all must be aware of it, but I'll still list it for the few who don't.
在离开了小镇之前，五年来我，一直用这样的方式处理例假，另外一个例假带来的不便，是社会强加在，月经期的女孩和妇女的一些限制，我想大家都有所耳闻，我将为那些不知道的人一一列举。
I was not allowed to touch or eat pickles. I was not allowed to sit on the sofa or some other family member's bed. I had to wash my bed sheet after every period, even if it was not stained. I was considered impure and forbidden from worshipping or touching any object of religious importance. You'll find signposts outside temples denying the entry of menstruating girls and women.
我不能碰也不能吃腌菜，我不能坐在沙发上，也不能坐在其他家庭成员的床上，每次例假结束我都要清洗床单，即使床单上没有污渍，我被认定是不洁之人，不允许参拜或触摸任何宗教物品，不允许经期女性进入庙宇，的警示牌随处可见。
Ironically, most of the time it is the older woman who imposes such restrictions on younger girls in a family.After all, they have grown up accepting such restrictions as norms. And in the absence of any intervention, it is the myth and misconception that propagate from generation to generation.
讽刺的是，这些限制往往是家族中，年纪较大的女性，强加到年轻女性身上的，毕竟随她们长大她们接受这些限制，并且将其当成标准，在没有任何干预的情况下，这样的传播和误解，一代一代的传播下来。
During my years of work in this field, I have even come across stories where girls have to eat and wash their dishes separately. They're not allowed to take baths during periods, and in some households they are even secluded from other family members. About 85 percent of girls and women in India would follow one or more restrictive customs on their periods every month. Can you imagine what this does to the self-esteem and self-confidence of a young girl? The psychological trauma that this inflicts, affecting her personality, her academic performance and every single aspect of growing up during her early formative years?
在我研究这几年的研究中，我甚至听到过，女孩需要单独吃饭和洗碗，这样的故事，她们在经期不允许洗澡，有的家庭甚至把她们关起来，以防和其他家庭成员接触，在印度大约85%的女性，在例假期间都会至少遵循，一条这些限制性的习俗，你能想象这对一个年轻女孩，的自尊和自信产生什么样的影响吗，这造成的心理创伤，可以影响女孩的性格，学习成绩，和在早年性格形成过程中，每个方面的成长。
I religiously followed all these restrictive customs for 13 years, until a discussion with my partner, Tuhin,changed my perception about menstruation forever. In 2009, Tuhin and I were pursuing our postgraduation in design. We fell in love with each other and I was at ease discussing periods with him. Tuhin knew little about periods.
我虔诚地遵循了13年的习俗，直到我和一个叫图新的朋友聊天，让我永久的改变了对生理期的看法，2009年图新和我，都在读设计专业研究生，我们彼此相爱，我和他谈论经期也比较自在，图新不懂例假。
He was astonished to know that girls get painful cramps and we bleed every month.
当他知道女孩每个月有月经，甚至还要流血时，震惊不已。
Yeah. He was completely shocked to know about the restrictions that are imposed upon menstruating girls and women by their own families and their society. In order to help me with my cramps, he would go on the Internet and learn more about menstruation. When he shared his findings with me, I realized how little I knew about menstruation myself. And many of my beliefs actually turned out to be myths.
是的，当他知道经期女性，受到的家庭和社会，强加的种种限制后，更加震惊不已，为了帮助我更好的度过月经，他会去搜索网络，学习更多经期知识，当他和我分享月经知识的时候，我才意识到自己对月经知之甚少，很多我之前所相信的都是假的。
That's when we wondered: if we, being so well educated, were so ill-informed about menstruation, there would be millions of girls out there who would be ill-informed, too. To study -- to understand the problem better, I undertook a year-long research to study the lack of awareness about menstruation and the root cause behind it.
我们怀疑：如果我们作为受过高等教育的人，都对月经知之甚少，其它数百万的女孩知道的就更少了，为了研究，为了更好地研究这个问题，我用了一年的时间来，研究为什么月经问题一直被忽视，和根植于背后的问题。
While it is generally believed that menstrual unawareness and misconception is a rural phenomenon, during my research, I found that it is as much an urban phenomenon as well. And it exists with the educated urban class, also. While talking to many parents and teachers, I found that many of them actually wanted to educate girls about periods before they have started getting their menstrual cycle. And -- but they lacked the proper means themselves. And since it is a taboo, they feel inhibition and shameful in talking about it.
为什么大家普遍认为，对于月经的忽视和误解，是一个农村问题，在我的研究过程中，我发现它也是城市问题，它在城市，受过良好教育的人群里也存在着，通过和许多家长和老师的讨论，我发现他们中很多人，实际上希望在女孩的月经来临前，告诉她月经的知识，恩，但是他们缺乏合适的方法，因为这是一个禁忌，他们在谈论，它的时候感觉压抑和羞耻。
Girls nowadays get their periods in classes six and seven, but our educational curriculum teaches girls about periods only in standard eight and nine. And since it is a taboo, teachers still skip the subject altogether.
现在女孩子大多在，六年级七年级开始来月经，但是我们的教育课程，在八，九年级的时候，才正式的讲月经的知识，而且正因为它是禁忌，老师们一起仍然跳过这些内容。
So school does not teach girls about periods, parents don't talk about it. Where do the girls go? Two decades ago and now -- nothing has changed. I shared these finding with Tuhin and we wondered: What if we could create something that would help girls understand about menstruation on their own -- something that would help parents and teachers talk about periods comfortably to young girls?
所以学校不告诉女孩经期知识，家长们也不谈论这些，那些女孩怎么办呢，20年来直到今天，一直都是这样，我和图新分享了，这些发现之后我们认为，我们应该创造一些东西，来帮助女孩了解他们自己的生理期，创造一些能够帮助家长和老师，更舒服地和孩子们谈论生理期的东西。
During my research, I was collecting a lot of stories. These were stories of experiences of girls during their periods. These stories would make girls curious and interested in talking about menstruation in their close circle. That's what we wanted. We wanted something that would make the girls curious and drive them to learn about it. We wanted to use these stories to teach girls about periods.
在我的研究中，我收集了很多故事，这些女孩们在她们经期时的经验故事，让其他女孩在这个，属于她们自己的圈子里，好奇并感兴趣地谈论这个问题，这就是我们想要的，我们想让女孩通过好奇心的驱使，去学习月经知识，我们希望用这些故事，来告诉女孩什么事例假。
So we decided to create a comic book, where the cartoon characters would enact these stories and educate girls about menstruation in a fun and engaging way. To represent girls in their different phases of puberty, we have three characters. Pinki, who has not gotten her period yet, Jiya who gets her period during the narrative of the book and Mira who has already been getting her period. There is a fourth character, Priya Didi.Through her, girls come to know about the various aspects of growing up and menstrual hygiene management.
所以我们决定写一本漫画书，里面的卡通角色演绎了这些故事，并用风趣迷人的方式，告诉女孩子们生理期的知识，为了给不同青春期阶段的女孩，更好地展示，我们有三个人物，平吉，她还没有开始例假，吉雅，她在这本书的叙述中，开始了例假，还有米娅，她已经开始了例假，还有第四个角色，皮里亚·迪迪，通过她女孩们知道，人体成长的方方面面，和经期卫生管理知识。
While making the book, we took great care that none of the illustrations were objectionable in any way and that it is culturally sensitive. During our prototype testing, we found that the girls loved the book. They were keen on reading it and knowing more and more about periods on their own. Parents and teachers were comfortable in talking about periods to young girls using the book, and sometimes even boys were interested in reading it.
在制作这本书的过程中，我们确保每一张插画都不会引起读者的反感，和文化的敏感，在我们第一版书的测试中，我们发现女孩很爱这本书，她们急不可待地读，知道了越来越多，她们自己的经期的知识，家长和老师使用这本书，给女孩们讲经期知识时，也非常的舒服，有的时候甚至男孩也对它感兴趣。
The comic book helped in creating an environment where menstruation ceased to be a taboo. Many of the volunteers took this prototype themselves to educate girls and take menstrual awareness workshops in five different states in India. And one of the volunteers took this prototype to educate young monks and took it to this monastery in Ladakh.
这本漫画书改变了大众的氛围，月经再也不是一个禁忌，在印度五个不同的地区，很多志愿者用这本书的初版，来教育女孩并且开展，提高月经认识的讲习班，甚至有一位志愿者，用这本书去教育年轻的僧人，把它带到了拉达克的寺庙中。
We made the final version of the book, called "Menstrupedia Comic" and launched in September last year.And so far, more than 4,000 girls have been educated by using the book in India and --Thank you.And 10 different countries. We are constantly translating the book into different languages and collaborating with local organizations to make this book available in different countries.
我们这本书的最终版本，叫做“月经百科”漫画，在去年九月正式出版，到目前为止，在印度和其他十余个不同的国家，超过4000个女孩受到了这本书的教育，我们不断地把这本书翻译成不同的语言，不断地和当地的机构合作，让这本书在不同的国家可以上市。
15 schools in different parts of India have made this book a part of their school curriculum to teach girls about menstruation.
在印度15所来自不同地方的学校，把这本书纳入了教学课程之中，来为女孩讲解经期知识。
I am amazed to see how volunteers, individuals, parents, teachers, school principals, have come togetherand taken this menstrual awareness drive to their own communities, have made sure that the girls learn about periods at the right age and helped in breaking this taboo.
我惊讶于志愿者，个人，家长，老师，校长，共同努力，提升所在社区的女性生理意识，确保女孩在正确的时间学习生理知识，并帮助破除这个禁忌。
I dream of a future where menstruation is not a curse, not a disease, but a welcoming change in a girl's life.And I would --And I would like to end this with a small request to all the parents here.
我希望将来有一天，月经不再是一个诅咒，不再是疾病，而是一个女孩生命中，受到欢迎的转折点，我希望、我希望在结尾，对各位家长提出一个小小的要求。
Dear parents, if you would be ashamed of periods, your daughters would be, too. So please be period positive.
亲爱的家长们，如果您对于例假感到羞耻，您的女儿也会一样，所以做一个积极面对例假的人。
Thank you.(Applause)
谢谢。（掌声）
2016年里约奥运会上，傅园慧赛后接受采访时的一句话：“因为昨天来例假了”引发了网络热议，被一些人认为公开谈“例假”二字不够得体。
2018年，原本译名为《护垫侠》的印度电影，在上映前改名为《印度合伙人》，手里的卫生巾也改成了一张白纸。
在我们的生活里，对于月经话题的禁忌以及月经羞耻，其实远比我们想象的要严重得多。
那么，我们应该用怎样的态度对待月经呢？
去除掉月经这一词带来的“羞耻感”，无论男孩女孩，都能认认真真地了解人类正常的生理现象，让“月经”、“生理期”、“卫生巾”这些词语能不再被避讳，成为常态化的讨论。
希望有一天，所有的女性来月经时都能不避讳地说：“我来月经了我身体不舒服”，就像说自己感冒了或者肚子疼一样理所应当。可以不用遮遮掩掩地拿着卫生巾、卫生棉条去厕所，就像拿着纸巾去厕所一样理所应当。
学校可以光明正大、认真地上生理卫生课，让男生女生都知道这个每个女性都有的生理现象，每个女生都能懂得照顾好自己，使用合适的经期卫生用品。
而一线的女性医务工作者的需求能被重视起来，得到充足的卫生用品，安心奋战。
“月经羞耻”在是这几年被西方媒体广泛关注的一个话题，在国内很少听见。这并不意味着它不存在，相反，它隐藏在每个女孩长大的过程中，成为了我们无意识养成的一种“坏习惯”。
如果有同学对这方面由更深的思考和感触，也可以从这方面入手，去做点力所能及的事，让社会记住自己也让美国名校记住自己。
