Bill to provide free feminine hygiene products in schools fails again, despite need
By Ella Denton
Kentucky Health News
For more than 30 years, Kentucky lawmakers have filed bills to provide free access to feminine hygiene products for elementary and secondary students. And every year, including this one, those efforts have failed.
Samantha Sams, head principal of Second Street School in Frankfort, told Kentucky Health News that she would support this initiative.
“Feminine hygiene and menstruation may be taboo topics in some circles, but they are an undeniable reality that schools must be prepared to address,” Sams said. “Making these products freely available eliminates any additional burden on teachers and staff and ensures students never feel embarrassed or distracted from their studies.”
House Bill 74, sponsored by Rep. Matthew Lehman, D-Newport, would require public schools to provide free feminine hygiene products to students in grades four through 12. It also would require the local board of education to create policies for the distribution of the free products.
The bill was assigned to the House Appropriations and Revenue Committee on Feb. 4 but was never given a hearing. It has four co-sponsors, all Democrats. Attempts to reach Lehman were unsuccessful.
There are two days left in the 2025 legislative session, March 27 and 28, where lawmakers will return to Frankfort to override the governor’s vetoes. Any legislation passed on those two days can be vetoed without fear of a legislative override.
HB 74 doesn’t go as far as last year’s bill, which also called on the legislature to remove sales tax on feminine hygiene products. In 2024, Kentucky was one of 20 states that still charges sales tax for menstrual products, according to the Alliance for Period Supplies.
Why is this bill needed?
In 2022, the Kentucky Medical Association issued a resolution stating that 23% of teenage girls had difficulty obtaining menstrual products and 51% had worn menstrual products longer than recommended. It also states that the use of standard menstrual products for a longer duration than recommended and the use of alternative products “could produce negative side effects such as urinary tract infections, vulvar contact dermatitis, yeast infections, bacterial vaginosis and even toxic shock syndrome.”
The “State of the Period 2023” report found that 23% of teens have struggled to afford period products and 40% of teens have worn period products for longer than recommended. Another report found that 80% of students either missed or knew someone who missed class time because they did not have access to period products. Both of these reports were done by Thinx Inc., a period and incontinence underwear brand, and PERIOD, a nonprofit that focuses on combating period poverty and stigma.
According to a 2024 Children’s National Hospital study, a third (34.8%) of teens and young adults in the United States can’t afford, or otherwise access, menstrual products.
The stigma around period poverty can also negatively impact students, with 75% of students in the State of the Period 2023 report saying there is a negative association with periods that they are gross and unsanitary, and 60% agree that society teaches people to be ashamed of their periods.
Advocates for legislation to provide free feminine hygiene products in schools and all public settings say this would be a critical first step to addressing the problem.
Success stories
States that have implemented bills similar to HB74 have seen success and a notable increase in attendance among female students during their menstrual period.
According to a 2016 article by Julie Pennell for NBC’s Today, a school in New York City that started stocking free menstrual products observed a 2.4% improvement in student attendance after the dispensers were installed.
Further, in September 2024, Lacey Gero, director of government relations at the National Diaper Bank Network at the Alliance for Period Supplies, told Healio, a medical media company, that after North Carolina implemented a grant program to provide access to period products in schools, the schools reported students had higher self-esteem, less stress and fewer times of missing class, plus it destigmatized menstruation.
Ella Denton is a student at the University of Kentucky College of Public Health and a spring intern for Kentucky Health News, an independent news service of the Institute for Rural Journalism in the School of Journalism and Media at the University of Kentucky, with support from the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky.