Record demand for sexual health services amid spending cuts
From BBC News.
A record 3.3 million visits were made to sexual health clinics in England last year, as local councils warn over funding cuts and stretched resources.
Figures show there were 3,323,275 visits across the country in 2017, an increase of 13% from 2013.
The extra demand comes at the same time as £600m has been cut from public health spending.
The Local Government Association (LGA) is urging the government to reverse the budget cuts.
The LGA, which represents 370 councils in England and Wales, welcomed the increase in people taking their sexual health seriously but said it would be “hugely challenging” to maintain services at current levels.
It also warned that some areas may struggle to respond to unforeseen sexually transmitted infection (STI) outbreaks unless cuts were halted.
The total number of sexual health screens – tests for chlamydia, gonorrhoea, syphilis and HIV – has risen by nearly one-fifth (18%) from 1,513,288 in 2013 to 1,778,306 in 2017, figures from Public Health England revealed…
…Dr Olwen Williams, president of the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV said: “Cuts to sexual health funding have come at the worst possible time.
…”Record demand for services, dramatic increases in syphilis and gonorrhoea diagnoses and the spread of treatment-resistant infection in recent years mean that many services are struggling to cope, despite valiant efforts from staff.”
[Editor’s comment: This is an epidemic of disease which can mostly be controlled and reduced by simple changes in behaviour that cost the taxpayer nothing. An effective strategy surely demands combining medical treatment with prevention measures, yet these are not mentioned at all in this piece. Increasingly, liberal sex education, now largely controlled by lobby groups, has spectacularly failed to protect the sexual health of our young people. The leaders of our local councils refuse to recognise the need for prevention measures; they simply demand more money, to the extent of blaming what is a crisis of sexual immorality on ‘government cuts’.]
See also: 9 things you should know about the STD crisis, by Joe Carter, The Gospel Coalition
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