Period pad prices push girls out of school in Africa
Period poverty worsens with inflation crisis, as girls trade sex for pads or risk infection by using rags, leaves and cow dung
- Inflation pushes up prices of period products across Africa
- More girls miss school and use dangerous alternatives
- Campaigners call for end to taxes, more menstrual cups
Kent Mensah for Thomson Reuters Foundation News.
Cholera tragedy in Indian village sheds light on power debts
Residents of Pachdongri village had hoped the completion of the tap water project in July would lead to a steady supply and end their dependence for drinking water on a well 2 km away.
Farmer Akshay Amode, 24, saw clean water gush from his household tap the first time a day before power was cut.
The villagers then resorted to well water again - but it was contaminated with sewage due to runoff triggered by heavy rains, said health officials who tested the water.
About 200 people took ill after drinking it and five died, officials said.
Among them was Sahdev Ramaji Akhande's wife, who had yet to see a running tap in her home.
The 32-year-old farmer, a father of two, recalled the night his wife writhed in pain as he struggled to organise a private car to rush her to hospital.Three days after she died, Akhande's home got a tap water connection. But the supply is still intermittent, so he drinks water from tankers serving the village since the cholera outbreak and buys water for his farm. He knew nothing of another impending expense: the village council - yet to pay its outstanding power bill - is mulling a doubling of the monthly water tax from 100 rupees per household.
Roli Srivastava also for Thomson Reuters Foundation News; it doesn’t often happen that I include two stories from the same source, but I found them really powerful to understand what local-global crises around inflation and price hikes really mean for many people in Africa or India.
Roy Hackett obituary
A humble man, Hackett was pleased by the level of respect he was accorded in Bristol in his later years, mentioning with pride that his grandson’s school had a picture of him on the wall. He also remained committed to supporting the black community in Bristol, joking that “a lot of young people ask me if I can help them and I always say yes – as long as I can sit in the shade”.
Kehinde Andrews remembers a great person in his obituary for the Guardian.
