Government promises that reimbursement of sanitary protection will be effective in 2025 and acknowledges "delay"

The government committed this Wednesday, May 28, to making effective "before the end of the year" the reimbursement of reusable sanitary protection for women under 26 and those in the most precarious situations , a measure adopted at the end of 2023 but not yet implemented.

"There is a delay, and this delay is unacceptable," acknowledged the Minister for Gender Equality, Aurore Bergé, when questioned on the subject in the National Assembly by Socialist Party MP Céline Thiébault-Martinez.

"This is why, together with the Minister of Health, Yannick Neuder, we will both ensure that this is possible before the end of the year, that it is reimbursed and that the commitments are kept, because this commitment is necessary," she added during the current questions session to the government.

The 2024 Social Security budget , adopted at the end of 2023, provided for the reimbursement of reusable menstrual protection (panties and cups) for insured persons under 26, as well as for beneficiaries of the complementary health solidarity (C2S) without age limit.

"It's May 2025. Nothing has changed. No decree, no specifications to define the products and models supported," lamented Céline Thiébault-Martinez in her interpellation.

"When will women finally have access to the promised reimbursement?" she asked, pointing out that, in France, "one in three women" has already been confronted with "period poverty," with a cost to society: "School absenteeism, work absenteeism, girls giving up sports, in other words, house arrest."

In France, four million women lack menstrual protection, the ministry's website indicates on the occasion of World Menstrual Hygiene Day, celebrated every May 28.