Leeds will soon make sanitary products free to all young girls and women living in the city.

The city's council recently announced a new initiative to tackle period poverty, which affects many women and girls worldwide. Sanitary products will soon be available free of charge throughout the city's schools and libraries. Three months ago Scotland announced that it would be making sanitary products free to all those in schools and other educational institutes and now Leeds looks to follow its example. A pilot scheme is already underway in one of the city's schools, but the council hope to bring it to all schools and libraries as soon as possible.   According to BBC News, one out of every seven girls in the UK struggles to afford sanitary products every month. That means in a classroom of 28 girls, four of them are going without sanitary products. Organisations like Period Poverty Ireland aim to help women dealing with homelessness to access sanitary products but should we follow Scotland and Leeds and make them free to all young women? Products like pads and tampons are taxed and treated as luxury products even though they are essentially needed by women and young girls every day.