According to anti-poverty NGO The Borgen Project about 30% of South African school girls, about 7 million girls, do not attend school while they are menstruating because they cannot access sanitary products. As a result, the experiences of the girls being teased at school, in addition to the discomfort that comes with not wearing sanitary products, while they are menstruating, simply means that many miss school for about a week or two every month. Looking at this retrospectively, this limited education means that there is a significantly small chance for girls to lift themselves and their communities out of the cycle of poverty – this is the crux of period poverty in South Africa. Well, one innovation born to address this issue are period panties which are long-term absorbent underwear, that can be washed and reused as a solution to sanitary towels and the like. The innovator and founder of South African period underwear company Blushproof Thandi Hartmann together with Medical Anthropologist Lucy Khofi join Lerato Mbele to walk us through period poverty and the innovation.