This week, members of the U.K. parliament voted against a proposal to abolish the 5 percent value-added tax on sanitary products, a move that demonstrates far more sinister truths about perceptions of menstruation in our supposedly modern world.

The VAT is applied to items considered non-essential luxuries. Other items that are not considered luxuries include edible cake decorations, crocodile meat and caravans. Items that are considered luxuries include twixes, truffles and tampons.

That’s right — the hygienic sanitation necessary to absorb the natural bodily function which myself and the billions of women across the world have little to no control over is considered a luxury by my government and the E.U. When the E.U. proposed to reconsider tax on these products on Tuesday, 305 members of parliament including the very MP responsible for representing me, in my home constituency of Cheltenham, voted no.

In fact, a staggering 55 of 191 women voted against removing tax on the material that soaks up shedded womb lining, mostly, discreetly; I can't begin to comprehend this fact, since I assume most if not all women have uteruses. The 250 men who voted no have never had to suffer the crippling pain that is a fairly common occurrence when Aunt Flo visits, which we so often have to grin and bear for fear of making the other sex uncomfortable. Yet they felt that they were representing their constituents by continuing to brand such a deeply personal item as a luxury.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a luxury is “a state of great comfort or elegance, especially when involving great expense.” These men clearly have no idea what a period feels like, so let me be very clear: never, in my decade of experiencing my time of the month, have I felt comfortable or elegant. Admittedly, tampons go someway towards making me feel less uncomfortable whilst blood pours out of my body, and I suppose remaining stain-free through shark week is somewhat more elegant than leaking through underwear and outerwear. If this is where we are setting the bar for such terms then we are aiming far, far too low. And as for the expense? Well it depends on who you’re talking to.

The VAT is only 5 percent. I recognize that for me this is not a large amount of money. The significance is in the symbolism; how little consideration is given to the very real problems that some women face in controlling their menstrual flow. Homeless women struggle to access sanitary items, even from shelters, and often have no choice but to use tissues from public toilets, a messy process that often leaves them stuck with soiled underwear.

Many girls across the world are forced to miss school and are considered dirty during their periods. Given that periods are a monthly occurrence, the stigma of monthly absences can jeopardize future career plans. In Venezuela, the price of sanitary products can eat up a third of a minimum wage salary. These problems are far more severe than a tax that equates to a few extra pennies, but has anything been done to help them by those in power?

In a country where condoms are free to any citizen to improve the sexual health of the nation, why can’t tampons be the same? Why, then, when toilet paper and soap are readily available in public toilets, are we forced to pay a pound for a sanitary product from a machine that, in my experience, is usually broken? When the Western world champions girls’ education in the developing world, why are we not doing more to address an actionable obstacle that they face? Why did MP Bill Cash feel like he should use the word products rather than tampons when discussing the very proposal that has made me so angry? And why am I embarrassed to be writing about periods on the Internet?

We throw the word stigma around without doing anything to change our own behavior that buys into it. This stigma has consequences beyond amusing euphemisms to avoid saying menstruation. Our embarrassment and consequent reluctance to do anything about it is harming millions of women, and it has to stop.

So I speak to the U.K. government when I say this: you are clearly too embarrassed by the thought of women bleeding each month to demonstrate your support through taking the tax off tampons, but can you please do something to help the women who are truly in need? Because they are the ones paying the costs of such attitudes. If this is a luxury, then it’s one we can’t afford.