HIV prevention cut for gay men
Public Health minister Yvette Cooper told the House of Commons this spring
that the HIV prevention budget aimed at gay men has been cut from 24 per
cent of overall expenditure in 1998-1999 to 21 per cent in 1999-2000.
Spending targeted at people with links to sub-Saharan Africa was 6 per
cent of the budget, 14 per cent was aimed at injecting drug users and
3 per cent at women partners of men in high risk groups, the minister
said.
More GUM doctors being trained
Health minister John Hutton has announced that more GUM consultants are
being trained. The minister told parliament that there are 275 genito-urinary
medicine consultants at the moment; there will be a further 35 trained
specialists by 2004 and a further 25 by 2009.
Sex clinics 'can't cope'
Hospital specialists are warning of a new epidemic of sexually-transmitted
infections (STIs) because of chronic under-funding at clinics across the
country. The BBC reports a study revealing a doubling of time it takes
to get an appointment for tests and says appointments in the North West
now take twice as much waiting time as they did just six months ago.
Breaking the drug abuse cycle
DrugScope, the UK's largest drug charity, has launched a campaign to tackle
fatal drug overdoses in the UK. In 1999, 2,857 Britons died of drug overdoses
- 40 per cent of the EU total. Most deaths were among drug injectors,
who, research shows,
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are 14 times more likely to die than their peers. The campaign provides
