Student Wellness Center removes free HIV and STI testing

Brooke Tacsar
Fri, 16 Feb 2024 01:53:23 +0000
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The Student Wellness Center located in the RPAC is no longer offering free STI testing. Credit: Brooke Tacsar | Lantern Reporter

?The Student Wellness Center no longer provides free HIV or STI testing for students due to the capacity limitations of local clinics in Columbus.

?Before COVID-19, the Student Wellness Center was able to supply free testing for both sexually transmitted infections and the human immunodeficiency virus – a virus that attacks a body’s immune system and causes AIDS – by trained students and staff, Arianna Camel, the associate director of the Student Wellness Center, said.

?In April 2022, free STI and HIV testing were brought back to the center, with roughly 300 students using the service year-round through the help of outside clinics such as Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Camel said. It was removed this academic year because the capacity of local health care communities became smaller due to limited staff and low funding in the health care system since COVID-19.?

?“It is no fault of anyone,” Camel said. “It’s just where we’ve been with the needs of our health and well-being experts across the community to be able to provide it.”

?Although the testing is no longer available, Camel said the Student Wellness Center will be providing students with free Lyft passes to nearby testing centers, including Equitas Health, Columbus Public Health, Out of the Closet and Nationwide Children’s Hospital.

?To receive a ride to and from these locations, Camel said students can email the Student Wellness Center for free Lyft vouchers.

?The Student Wellness Center said it no longer provides testing at its office, located in the RPAC, but works to provide an up-to-date list of local centers that provide free walk-in or by-appointment testing.

?“It’s not that we don’t want to, it’s just that our partners don’t have the capacity [and] rightfully so,” Camel said. “Health care workers are just overworked still.”??

?Although free testing is no longer provided at the Student Wellness Center’s office, students can get HIV or STI testing at Student Health Services, according to the Student Wellness Center’s website. This service, however, has a cost associated with it but can be covered by insurance.

?“We’re very much hoping that we are able to bring [free testing] back because we do recognize that is something absolutely necessary for our campus,” Camel said.

?Sydney Heckeler, a third-year and secretary of Ohio State’s Student Advocates for Sexual Health Awareness, said the organization feels the lack of free STI and HIV testing on campus will negatively impact students’ sexual health.

?“[The STI and HIV testing] is definitely a very missed program,” Heckeler said. “I know that one of the top questions we get asked when we’re tabling or when we’re with students on campus is where they can get STI [and HIV] testing.”

?Heckeler said that while the lack of free testing is disappointing, the university excels in its cooperation with the organization and willingness to work toward alternative solutions to sexual health.

?“They still are doing a really good and honestly better [job] than probably most other universities,” Heckeler said.

Before COVID-19, Camel said the Student Wellness Center provided free testing Monday through Friday, but it was primarily done through fellow students and staff.