A Colorado state representative has garnered viral attention online for a speech about the need for period products in jails as the lawmakers appear poised to increase the number of free tampons and pads available to inmates.

Rep. Leslie Herod, a Denver Democrat, grabbed the attention of viral video site “Now This” last week. The accompanying video had been viewed about 150,000 times as of Monday morning.

“Yes, a lot of people don’t want to talk about it,” Herod said in the speech. “But I say, if you don’t want to say the word ‘tampon,’ then you shouldn’t restrict access to one.”

Holding up tampons and pads, Herod said inmates have bartered and traded hygiene products within Colorado facilities. In some cases, women traded sex for tampons, she said. In other cases, women who soiled their clothes because they didn’t have period products were punished.

House Bill 1224 would require jails in Colorado to provide a range of period products to people in custody at no expense to the inmates. Under the bill, jails would submit the cost of the products to the legislature and would be reimbursed by the state.

In a fiscal note, legislative staffers predicted the bill would increase costs minimally because most jails currently provide “some form of menstrual hygiene products.”

The House voted unanimously March 20 to approve the bill and send it to the Senate. It had previously passed out of a House committee unanimously. Companion legislation is being sponsored in the Senate by Sen. Faith Winter, D-Westminster.

State prisons are already required to provide feminine hygiene products. Lawmakers passed a budget amendment in 2017 requiring them in prisons and set aside $40,000 to cover the costs.

There is no statewide requirement for local jails, however. That allows counties to craft their own policies. In some counties, pads are free but tampons must be purchased from commissaries.