Charlie Ruth Castro is a Rotarian, founding member of the Rotary E-Club Sogomaoso Global, entrepreneur, and Women’s Rights activist.

She founded MujeresConDerechos.org (“Women with Rights”), a social movement created by Colombian women and men leaders, where they focus on sharing honest, relevant and current information that promotes knowledge and empowerment of sexual and reproductive rights of girls and women in Latin America.

Mujeres Con Derechos are teaming up with Rotary Club of Cambridge, Rotary E-Club Sogamoso Global, and Rotary Club of Zapopan to deliver 10,000 menstrual cups to girls in rural areas and prisons in Latin Amerca.

“Our goal through the distribution of the menstrual cups is to facilitate the lives of girls and women so that they stop seeing menstruation as a problem.”

Around the globe, there are thousands of women who still do not have access to safe, efficient, eco-friendly and economic menstrual products. We want to change this!

Menstrual cups have the potential to help girls and women:

HEALTHY FOR GIRLS AND WOMEN

a) Improve women’s health, acceptance of our bodies, and menstrual hygiene. Unlike menstrual pads and tampons that contain chemical compounds such as chlorine that are transformed into dioxin – a highly carcinogenic element – the menstrual cup is made of medical grade silicone that is non-toxic and requires only hot water for sterilization and soap without perfume.

GOOD FOR WOMEN’S POCKETS

b) Menstrual cups save money. The menstrual pads and tampons are expensive for women’s pocket. They are single-use products. Expensive and even inaccessible for women in the social base or in limited spaces such as prisons, orphanages, shelters or even in rural or indigenous areas.

SMART FOR THE PLANET

c) Menstrual cups reduce the waste of plastic of difficult degradation that contaminates the water sources. For every woman who wears menstrual cups, 12,000 non-biodegradable pads / tampons (weighing between 150 and 200 kilos) are saved from pollution on the planet.

If you want to learn more about Castro’s project, watch her presentation at the  Rotary International Convention in Hamberg below.

Read the full article by Mujeres con Derechos here.