Troubled glbt youth in Canterbury will be more at risk of physical and mental illness following the planned closure of a Christchurch youth health centre, according to the NZ AIDS Foundation.
The 198 Youth Health Centre
|
"Young people have disproportionately high rates of STIs and suicide [and] marginalised young people, like gay and bisexual youth, are even more at risk of sexual and mental ill-health and also have lower rates of accessing health care from a GP," says the NZAF Director HIV Prevention and Communications, Simon Harger-Ford.
"Closing the 198 Youth Health Centre means there may well be more young people with STIs [which] will go untreated for longer," he says.
Last year, a study published by the University of Auckland found that same/both-sex-attracted students had greater difficulties than opposite-sex-attracted students in accessing healthcare, especially for sexual, reproductive and emotional health.
Harger-Ford says lack of a facility such as the 198 Centre will create "enormous" future social and fiscal burdens.
