{"id":334043,"date":"2026-03-17T14:08:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T14:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/334043\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T14:08:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T14:08:13","slug":"forum-balancing-privacy-with-clinical-care-needs-in-sti-testing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/334043\/","title":{"rendered":"Forum: Balancing privacy with clinical care needs in STI testing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"font-body-baseline-regular text-primary\" data-testid=\"article-paragraph-annotation-test-id\">We refer to Ms Fikri Alkhatib\u2019s letter \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.straitstimes.com\/opinion\/forum\/forum-community-based-anonymous-sti-testing-will-improve-access-to-sexual-healthcare?ref=inline-article\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" class=\"gap-x-04 items-center inline text-primary-60 select-auto\" aria-label=\"link\" target=\"_blank\" data-testid=\"custom-link\">Community-based anonymous STI testing will improve access to sexual healthcare<\/a>\u201d (March 4).<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-body-baseline-regular text-primary\" data-testid=\"article-paragraph-annotation-test-id\">We agree with the writer\u2019s suggestion.\u00a0Indeed,\u00a0human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)\u00a0and\u00a0sexually transmitted infection (STI)\u00a0testing is widely accessible at general practitioner clinics, polyclinics, the Department of STI Control clinic, and hospitals, with subsidies available at public healthcare institutions.\u00a0To encourage regular testing, HIV self-testing kits have been made available at selected retail pharmacies since January 2025.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-body-baseline-regular text-primary\" data-testid=\"article-paragraph-annotation-test-id\">Recognising that stigma remains an issue, with the exception of HIV,\u00a0personal identifiers are not required when healthcare providers notify the Communicable Diseases Agency (CDA) for STIs such as syphilis, gonorrhoea and chlamydia \u2013 these\u00a0STI notifications are therefore effectively anonymous. <\/p>\n<p class=\"font-body-baseline-regular text-primary\" data-testid=\"article-paragraph-annotation-test-id\">That said, healthcare providers do maintain records of patients, including those who contracted STIs. <\/p>\n<p class=\"font-body-baseline-regular text-primary\" data-testid=\"article-paragraph-annotation-test-id\">Healthcare providers provide additional safeguards for such sensitive health information to ensure confidentiality.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-body-baseline-regular text-primary\" data-testid=\"article-paragraph-annotation-test-id\">Individuals should take steps to protect themselves and their partners from STIs. CDA also encourages individuals to take personal responsibility for their health and is strengthening community outreach through partnerships, dialogues and peer support.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-body-baseline-regular text-primary\" data-testid=\"article-paragraph-annotation-test-id\">Through these efforts, we hope to reduce the stigma of coming forward to undergo testing, and engender a supportive environment for individuals living with or at risk of HIV and STIs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-body-baseline-regular text-primary\" data-testid=\"article-paragraph-annotation-test-id\">Lim Poh Lian (Associate Professor)<br \/>Group Director of Communicable Diseases Programmes<br \/>Communicable Diseases Agency<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We refer to Ms Fikri Alkhatib\u2019s letter \u201cCommunity-based anonymous STI testing will improve access to sexual healthcare\u201d (March&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":274665,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[134,527,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-334043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=334043"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334043\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/274665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=334043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=334043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=334043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}