Paid leave for period pain!

As seen on the Endometriosis Research Center’s Facebook page:

Chinese province grants women leave for menstrual pain
By Shen Lu, CNN and Elaine Yu, for CNN
Updated 1:06 AM ET, Tue February 16, 2016

Beijing (CNN)Each month, Shao Jinwen’s lower abdomen throbs with a familiar, all-consuming pain.
It’s a pain she’s had to endure each month since she had her first period at age 13.

When we meet in Starbucks in downtown Beijing on a cheerless, sub-zero winter day, the 24-year-old theater director is looking pale and has four heat pads stuck to her waist to ease the breath-taking cramps.

 

“I just want to cut that part of my body off completely,” she says.

However, Shao is hopeful Chinese regulations that grant leave to female workers for severe period pain in some provinces will eventually be extended to Beijing.

Shao says legal recognition of the pain that she suffers every month would mark a step towards “taking menstruation seriously as a women’s health issue.”

When cramps enter the public debate

On Sunday, Anhui province introduced new regulations allowing female workers who suffer severe menstrual pain to take one to two days off every month, after presenting a doctor’s certificate.

Menstrual leave is already provided in Shanxi and Hubei provinces. And a consultation period to introduce the measure in the southern province of Guandong ended on December 3. There’s no word yet on when or if it will be passed.

It’s not the first time that paid menstrual leave has been debated in China, and other territories in the region, including Japan, Indonesia and South Korea and Taiwan, already have laws guaranteeing women days off during their periods.

It’s a right unheard of in most Western countries, but more and more high-profile women are drawing attention to the problem.

 

Lena Dunham, creator of the hit HBO series Girls, recently opened up about her struggles of living and working with endometriosis — a painful and little-known disease associated with menstruation, where a tissue lining the uterus grows outside of it — in an essay entitled “The Sickest Girl.”

Meanwhile, tech entrepreneur Martha Lane Fox criticized the Apple Health Kit app for not tracking periods when it was first launched. Later updates included the function.

Research suggests that globally, one in 10 women suffer from menstrual cramps (known medically as dysmenorrhea) so crippling that they could interfere with their daily activities. A quarter of women, on the other hand, are blessed with painless periods.

Asian countries lead the way

Since 1947, women in Japan have been granted menstrual leave and in South Korea, female workers have been entitled to a day off each month since 2001, but few employees in male-dominated workplaces are eager to exercise that right, according to the Korea Times.

In 2014, Taiwan amended its legislation to grant female workers up to one day of menstrual leave a month and three of these qualify for half pay.

Women in Indonesia are given a monthly two-day menstruation leave by law. However, workers rarely take up this right because companies perform physical examinations on women before granting the leave.

Who needs paid period leave in China?

Li Sipan, a woman’s rights advocate in Guangzhou where the draft regulation is being considered, told CNN that paid period leave is a right that women enduring acute menstrual pain ought to have, but she thinks the regulation is neither detailed enough nor realistically enforceable.

Those who would potentially benefit most from the regulation, according to Li, are female migrant workers behind assembly lines and sweeping the streets, who make up for the majority of such lines of work.

But things may look different in practice.

“For migrant workers, a doctor’s notice would be too much of a hassle to get,” Li said.

The current draft regulation does not specify what types of jobs would qualify employees for these holidays besides “women stationed to their posts for extended periods of time.”

Nor does it outline the possible consequences for companies ignoring the law.

Li, who has covered issues surrounding female labor extensively as a journalist, said she isn’t optimistic the regulation would be well executed even if it was worded more specifically.

“Female employers might worry they wouldn’t be hired because of the extra time off. So I’d suggest the regulation not target a specific gender, but women with specific jobs.”

Will it work?

Lowina Tse, a gynecologist and a director of Hong Kong Women Doctors Association, told CNN efforts to legislate around periods should be part of a move for better labor health protection.

Just as maternity leave can be phrased as family leave, cramps should be treated as a general health issue.

“Some women may have menstrual cramps, and others may have other chronic conditions such as irritable bowels, migraines, or asthma attacks every now and then.”

Ultimately, in Tse’s view, it is more constructive to get a check up and treat the underlying condition, although access to quality healthcare may be a privilege few have.

 

---

 

Women to get paid ‘period leave’ EVERY month: Company reveals plan to let female staff take time off during cycle – but how do their male colleagues feel?
By Martha Cliff for MailOnline
Published: 09:54 EST, 1 March 2016 | Updated: 03:26 EST, 2 March 2016

A UK company is set to create a ‘period policy’ to give long-suffering women time off work during their monthly cycle.

The new initiative aims to tap into female staff’s ‘natural rhythms’ in order to create a happier and more productive work environment – and it could be a UK first.

Company director Bex Baxter, who employs 31 staff – seven male – at the social community group Coexist, wants to change the stigma around ‘women’s issues’.

Bex, 40, said: ‘I have managed many female members of staff over the years and I have seen women at work who are bent over double because of the pain caused by their periods.

‘Despite this, they feel they cannot go home because they do not class themselves as unwell.

‘And this is unfair. At Coexist we are very understanding. If someone is in pain – no matter what kind – they are encouraged to go home.

For women, one of these is their menstrual cycles. Naturally, when women are having their periods they are in a winter state, when they need to regroup, keep warm and nourish their bodies.

‘The spring section of the cycle, immediately after a period is a time when women are actually three times as productive as usual.’

Bex says it’s a cause close to her heart as she too suffers from bad cramps every month.

She continued: ‘My team here have always been very generous – I’ve been able to take time off when I’ve needed it, but always put it back in again. But until now there haven’t been any formal guidelines.’

The idea has been welcomed enthusiastically by staff of both genders.

Bex added: ‘For too long there’s been a taboo surrounding periods – I have women staff telling me they’re ashamed to admit they’re in pain.

‘I want us to break down that shame and replace the negativity with positivity. Both men and women have been open to the ideas – especially from the younger generation. 

‘I was talking to someone the other day and they said if it were men who had periods then this policy would have been brought in sooner.

‘It’s not just about taking time off if you feel unwell – but about empowering people to be their optimum selves. 

‘If you work with your natural rhythms, your creativity and intelligence is more fulfilled and that’s got to be good for business.’

But ‘period policies’ are no new thing. Menstrual leave began in Japan in 1947 and other countries including South Korea, Taiwan and Indonesia also have laws in place allowing women to take time off work when they are on their period.

SIGNS THAT YOUR PERIOD PAIN IS NOT NORMAL
1. Severity: Extreme pain that over the counter medication can not ease
2. Location: Lower back or leg pain
3. Timing:  Pain during first two days of bleeding is normal, any other time during the cycle is not
4. Other factors: Pain during sex, bleeding between periods can be other symptoms of endometriosis

Most recently, the Chinese province Anhui has agreed to give women paid monthly leave if they produce a doctor’s letter.

And sportswear giant Nike is thought to be the only worldwide company to officially include menstrual leave as part of their Code of Conduct.

Bex and her team plan to formulate the policy together as part of a seminar at Hamilton House, Stokes Croft on March 15 called ‘Pioneering Period Policy: Valuing Natural Cycles in the Workplace’.

The seminar will tackle questions surrounding the issue, such as whether taking time off due to periods threatens women’s employability or whether it is unfair to men.

It will also explore whether it is feasible for women to take time off every month.

Seminar leader Alexandra Pope believes ‘cycle awareness’ helps both men and women become more productive.

Pope said: ‘In the past any proposal to allow women to, for example, have time off at menstruation has been derided by men and women alike. In this context menstruation is seen as a liability or a problem. Or as women getting ‘special treatment’.

‘The purpose of this policy initiative is to create a positive approach to menstruation and the menstrual cycle that empowers women and men and supports the effectiveness and wellbeing of the organisation. To restore the menstrual cycle as the asset it is.’