Visitors to the Osaka Expo can now access free menstrual products in several restrooms across the venue, as part of an initiative by faculty and students from Osaka University.
The group, known as the MeW Project from the university’s Graduate School of Human Sciences, has installed cardboard dispensers in nine women’s restrooms across pavilions. The devices, developed by the team, allow visitors to freely take sanitary pads and other menstrual products. Supplies are regularly restocked, and the initiative is funded by donations from corporate sponsors.
The project began in 2021 when the group placed its first dispenser in a campus restroom. It aims to make menstrual products as commonplace as toilet paper in public restrooms. Users have responded positively, with one saying, “It felt like someone empathized with the pain of menstruation.”
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