Texas’ Replacement for HIV Program Provides No HIV Services
When Texas abruptly ended its $600,000 HIV prevention contract with Planned Parenthood’s Houston affiliate in late December, state health officials promised that there would be no interruption in services. The Department of State Health Services parceled the money out to three county health departments in the Houston area and insisted at the time that the counties would have the capacity to pick up where Planned Parenthood left off.
But the Observer has learned that as of early June, Harris County’s health department has yet to perform a single HIV test with the money.
So far, the department has received about $250,000 in state funding but is still in the planning stages for its program. The Fort Bend and Galveston County health departments also received smaller portions of the money — Galveston began providing testing in March; Fort Bend hired its staff and began testing in May.
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