What do cuts in sexual health services mean for patients? Our report Understanding NHS financial pressures looks at how the slowdown in funding growth since 2010/11 has affected four very different parts of the health system. We chose one local authority-funded public health service to look at in depth: genito-urinary medicine (GUM) services that provide sexually transmitted infection (STI) testing and treatment in hospitals and local clinics.
Despite many examples of innovation in this part of the health system, we saw financial and other pressures having a real impact on patient care.
There is no doubt that GUM services are under pressure financially. The public health grant to local authorities was reduced by 6.7 per cent during 2015/16 with further reductions planned until 2020/21. Across England, spending on STI testing and treatment decreased by almost 4 per cent between 2013/14 and 2015/16, as local authorities implemented these cuts. The situation varies at a local level: around one in seven local authorities actually increased their spending by more than 20 per cent over that two-year period, while around one in four cut their spending by this amount. However, data on future spending plans shows cuts are set to deepen. The King's Fund
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