Cambridgeshire NHS has just 20 postal HIV tests available per day
People requiring regular HIV and other sexual health tests in Cambridgeshire say they have to stay up until midnight and have just two minutes to order one before they run out.
The home-testing kits are posted out by the Cambridgeshire NHS service iCash (integrated Contraception and Sexual Health) to anyone who believes they may be at risk of sexually transmitted diseases including chlamydia, gonorrhoea, HIV and syphilis.
The tests are free but service users have discovered that their availability has suddenly been reduced - leaving them facing £100 to buy the tests privately or putting their health at risk.
A Cambridge man who uses the service and wants to remain anonymous said: “There were all these headlines, towards the end of last year, about how there’s been this really big increase in diagnoses of venereal disease since the pandemic, especially among young people, aged 15 to 24.
“Broadly speaking, the two groups of people who need a lot of sexual health care are young people and gay men, and I’m allowed to be blunt about it because I’m in the latter camp. I have recently been having a lot of trouble getting a test kit and it never used to be difficult. And so yesterday I rang them up and I spoke to a nurse and she basically said that they had 20 test kits a day for all of Cambridgeshire, a population of 600,000 people. She said there were none available but I could buy one from a pharmacy. I looked and they cost £100.
“The tests become available online at midnight so you have to stay up to try to order one and they are all gone after two minutes. I’m really concerned for anyone who can’t afford to buy these kits as they are life saving.
“Also a drug called PREP, which helps to prevent HIV, is only available on the NHS if you can show you have had a recent test. So this has a huge knock-on effect.”
iCash Express Test is a free NHS service offering comprehensive three-monthly screening for sexually transmitted infections to those who are 16 and over and have no symptoms of an STI. The kit contains everything you need to collect your samples and return it to the laboratory for testing. Results are back within a few days.
A spokesperson for iCash said: “Funding for sexual health services comes from the national public health budget, which has been subject to significant pressure across England. iCaSH and our public health commissioners allocate funding across the clinic-based and online services we provide, to ensure as many people as possible can access the service they need.
“We have been working with our public health colleagues to identify ways we are able to maximise limited resources across our services as demand continues to grow. Regrettably, we have agreed to limit our online asymptomatic testing capacity within Cambridgeshire and Peterborough. This will mean a daily limit to the number of asymptomatic STI testing kits available for order. We understand how frustrating this must be and thank you in advance for your patience and understanding.”