2 rural Alberta teen sexual health clinics closing
Strathmore, Cochrane centres say their funding has been cut and they aren't seeing many clients
A lack of funding and clientele is forcing the closure of two Calgary-area sexual health clinics for teenagers.
Alberta Health Services says it's not financially viable to keep the centres open in Strathmore and Cochrane.
The centres, which helped teens with unplanned pregnancies and tested for sexually transmitted diseases, were open one day a week in each region, Mondays in Strathmore and Tuesdays in Cochrane.
AHS spokesman Laurie Blahitka says their primary source of funding ran out and they’re not busy enough to justify keeping them open.
"It’s not that I think it’s not worth it, I just think the numbers are low to make a case for it to pay for staffing for some weeks nobody comes," says Blahitka.
Still, sexual health advocate Pam Krause says it’s disappointing, especially when Alberta is seeing record numbers of STIs among young and rural Albertans.
"When is this government going to start working on prevention? They identify it, they do reports about and when we are talking about teens that’s exactly the population we should be reaching."
AHS says the services will still be available through physicians and school nurses.
But Krause says teens don't always feel comfortable talking about sex with their family doctors.
"Those teen clinics always really have that confidentially and/or anonymity connected to them and that's what I think is one of the most important factors is, as I said, it is actually speaking to that population and trying to draw them in to actually use services," says Krause.