• No results found

Lack of knowledge, regulations, and standards regarding product safety

4. The Mechanisms of Destigmatization

4.2. The menstrual product stigma and first steps toward destigmatization

4.2.3. Lack of knowledge, regulations, and standards regarding product safety

to see. It’s almost like I don’t want to throw it in the public trash can because someone might discover that I am menstruating. So, there are lots of taboo aspects out there when you start digging into it.”

With these notions about menstruation at the core of the stigma, there are a number of consequences on the menstrual product market. For example, there is a social risk implied by potentially failing products, which has effects on how consumers purchase and use them and simultaneously what and how products are developed from the producing end. It also has effects on how legislation treats menstrual products, where the regulations and standards are often associated with the neglect of menstrual products as a stigmatized matter by respondents. The lack of pressure from consumers to rectify these issues can also be connected to the stigma. These matters will be discussed in the forthcoming sections, where I discuss my findings on the ways in which the menstrual product stigma affects the menstrual product market in Sweden, currently.

4.2.3. Lack of knowledge, regulations, and standards regarding product

and how they affect users and the environment. The project leader for the Swedish Chemicals Agency’s investigation, Amanda Rosen, expressed that,

“There are lots of chemicals but very few regulations, and we know very little about the chemicals in the products we use, so it is very good to try to increase such knowledge […]

When asked why there is a lack of regulations on the matter, Rosen argued that legislation is often fragmented and unless specifically prioritized, certain product groups might fall between the cracks. This explanation is focused on the practical implications of how legislation is constructed and does not go into any depth about why certain products are not prioritized. Nonetheless, Rosen points to a disconnect between how legislation is developed and the reality of how laws and regulations might be needed and followed in practice. She stated that,

“Legislation is created in a fragmented way by different groups who think differently and different authorities who work in different places and who do not speak to each other, and to try to force reality into the legislative template is not always a simple task.”

Those products that are not prioritized explicitly, for instance, by being classified as medical devices in the case of menstrual products, are then covered by broader legislation such as the EU’s General Product Safety Directive. According to Rosen, this can cause problems when products might be in need of closer control due to the nature of their use, such as on sensitive skin or mucous membranes.

She added that,

“Legislation is built in a way that from the beginning it’s decided that products have to be safe to be on the market, and you say ‘okay, here you go’ to the companies to take responsibility for that, then rules are created for certain substances in specific products, but in between those there are gaps.”

The agency’s day-to-day work normally consists of monitoring and testing products in reference to existing legal frameworks; however, because of the lack of such frameworks that apply specifically to menstrual products, this project was different. Instead, they had to figure out new methods to investigate these products, including what chemicals to test and what levels might be considered acceptable. Because it was one of the first studies that was so comprehensive,

globally, the Chemicals Agency consider it to be a strong foundation for subsequent investigations to build upon. In other words, the study should not be seen as a one-time complete and flawless study; rather, it is an initial investigation with room for many improvements because there are still so many aspects that we know too little about when it comes to the safety of menstrual products. Hence, there is much more knowledge to be gathered. Rosen stated that,

“This is a good point of departure to discuss the contents of intimate hygiene products. The conclusion was that you people don’t need to worry, but it wasn’t like we didn’t find anything; rather, there were 21 different potentially dangerous substances. So, there are things to discuss. What we had to think most about were the three menstrual cups that contained siloxanes, where we were unable to make a risk judgement. Instead, we had to go on what we know about these types of substances, but we don’t think they are dangerous because of their size. We don’t think they can be absorbed by the body.”

Rosen further indicated that they have done their utmost to perform a high-quality investigation, but there is still a lot of unknowns about how the real-life use of menstrual products affects the body. The testing conducted at the Chemicals Agency took extreme scenarios into consideration, where the maximum amount of chemicals would be extracted from each menstrual product, exposing the body to plausibly much higher levels than during regular usage. In a sense, this again implies that expert knowledge remains disconnected from the actual use and experience of menstruating and using menstrual products. This leaves a gap between a report that states that there is a lack of knowledge and there might be a risk implied by using menstrual products, in relation to feeling reassured as a consumer that regular use is entirely risk free, because there is still no way of knowing for sure. Hence, more knowledge is needed in order to avoid stigmatization of menstrual products with regard to their safety. Rosen asserted that,

“How it actually works inside the body, we do not know. It is possible that substances stay completely within the menstrual products or that only a little is emitted. We do not know if all of them are emitted the first few days or whether it is emitted a little at a time. Those things have never been investigated, so we can’t say.”

Furthermore, the Chemicals Agency pointed out that it is manufacturers who hold the responsibility for the safety of menstrual products, as per current EU legislation where they are classified as consumer products. They also stated that the manufacturers should work toward increasing their knowledge of the substances in menstrual products, especially those whose effects are largely unknown through current research. Rosen stated that,

“The manufacturers themselves should find out more about these substances that we don’t know much about….”

On the same note, Anna-Lisa Persson at the Swedish Consumers’ Association argued that with multinational supply chains it might be difficult for manufacturers to control the raw materials they source, but they are likely to have rigorous testing and requirements set on their suppliers. Without standards or regulations prescribing regular third-party testing, however, Persson argues that they as a consumers’ organization and, indeed, consumers, have limited capacity to determine the safety of the products they use. Persson stated that,

“One could suppose that [manufacturers] have the same types of criteria for the cotton they purchase regardless of the origin, but Persson states that often the composition of products is the same across production facilities and countries, but the amount of pesticides in the cotton can vary a lot depending on, for example, the country and time of year. So, it boils down to what controls each manufacturer has in place, but that we do not know. They might have great controls. It would be interesting to know how companies purchase their cotton and rayon and what their criteria are.”

In summary, respondents indicate the lack of knowledge, regulations, and standards pertaining to the safety of menstrual products – a matter likely connected with the stigma on menstruation and menstrual products and consequential neglect thereof in political decision-making.