Online STI testing set to double the number of Londoners getting checked out

Thousands of people avoid using sexual health services, often due to time pressures or because they feel embarrassed; now, new online STI testing services are set to double to the number of people in London who get checked out.

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The new services mean that people can get STI testing kits delivered right to their front door; therefore, they do not have to sit through an awkward face-to-face conversation with a medical professional. The number of STIs diagnosed currently stands at a few hundred thousand a year. In 2015, for example, there were 434,564 STI cases diagnosed. Many medical professionals predict that this number will rise with the popularisation of at-home testing kits.

Safer sex in the UK

One of the main benefits of these services is that people are much more likely to get themselves checked out, meaning they are likely to detect STIs in the early phrases when they can’t do as much damage. This could reduce infertility rates and will reduce the chance of people unknowingly passing STIs on.

The medical experts behind the kits state that the kits are not an alternative to sexual health clinics; instead, the two should be used side by side to provide people with all the services they need.

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Meeting the demand

The service is being used to meet the huge need in London for more sexual health services. As it stands, most of the sexual health clinics in London are overwhelmed on a daily basis, which means some customers are turned away and asked to return the next day. Many people find the encounter both time-consuming and embarrassing; understandably, they do not always return for a test. The at-home service will provide these people with a much easier way to get tested.

If you want to access chlamydia testing kits in London, you can visit bexleysexualhealth.org for a chlamydia testing kit in London or a similar service provider.

So far, the at-home testing kits have been trialled on more than 2,000 people who live in the UK. The results reveal that the number of people tested almost doubled when they had access to at-home testing kits. This is a fantastic result and could certainly help to tackle the STI testing problems that London is currently facing.