Understanding associations between the COVID-19 pandemic and menstrual hygiene management among adolescent girls in Ethiopia: findings from a mixed-methods longitudinal study

While menstruation does not stop for an emergency, incorporating menstrual hygiene management (MHM) into relief activities has been a gap in humanitarian responses. Traditional male leadership of humanitarian programming may contribute to MHM being overlooked while stigma and taboos around issues that affect women (eg, MHM, gender-based violence, reproductive health) may result in the lack of prioritisation of these issues within the humanitarian sector.These challenges contribute to MHM being overlooked during emergencies and a recent systematic review on the MHM in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) and emergencies highlighted the limited evidence on MHM in emergency settings and called for further primary research on this topic.

Quantitative data were collected in December 2019–March 2020 prior to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic (henceforth, baseline) through in-person surveys with adolescents and their caregivers and in November 2020–February 2021 (henceforth, follow-up) with the same adolescents virtually via a telephone survey. The phone survey took place in all GAGE locations, except Afar where there was limited to no cell phone connectivity.

Suggested citation: 

Murphy, M., Dutton, R., Gezahegne, K., Jones, N., Seager, J. and Baird, S. (2024) 'Understanding associations between the COVID-19 pandemic and menstrual hygiene management among adolescent girls in Ethiopia: findings from a mixed-methods longitudinal study' BMJ Open 14:e078673 (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2023-078673)