BASHH STATEMENT ON THE WOMEN AND EQUALITIES SELECT COMMITTEE REPORT ON STIs IN YOUNG PEOPLE AND HIGH RISK GROUPS

26 March 2024

The British Association for Sexual Health and HIV (BASHH) welcomes the Women and Equalities Committee’s report and the Committee’s recognition of the need to deliver a national sexual health strategy. Sexual health services are facing pressing challenges, with rising demand for services against a backdrop of increasingly limited resource, and these challenges must be addressed in order to reduce deeply concerning trends in STI rates, not seen since the 1940s.

Professor Matt Phillips, BASHH President said:

“It is right that the Committee has urged government to work with BASHH and other partners to deliver on the commitment of a national sexual health strategy, for which we have now been waiting 5 years.”

“BASHH is open and willing to work with the government, and would be delighted to do so, in order to develop a comprehensive strategy that can support improved sexual health outcomes, including for those who are most at risk and who experience the greatest inequalities.”

“Sexual health services are under an immense amount of pressure, including severe recruitment challenges, year on year funding reductions, all against a backdrop of rising demand that GUM specialists have been working hard to meet. The government must now heed warnings and work with us to support sexual health services at this critical juncture.”