Sacramento is burning. Reported cases of gonorrhea and chlamydia in the sunny California county are the highest in the state, third highest in the nation, and officials are flailing about awkwardly, desperate to contain the unsexy public-health disaster. Their most baffling fix: distributing free ladies-only STD tests. Ladies-only. So don’t sweat it, boys. This doesn’t concern you.
All a discerning lady under the age of 25 need do is sign up on the program’s website and a discreet envelope containing a test will be mailed to her door:
“The Don’t Think, Know Home Test Kit is a new way for you to get tested for chlamydia and gonorrhea in the privacy and comfort of your home, or where ever [sic] you want!”
Like the gym. Or a Forever 21 fitting room. Or in a discreet corner of your open-layout startup office. You can test yourself wherever you want—and if you are sexually active and living in Sacramento county, that would probably be a smart idea. Rates of chlamydia are currently an embarrassing 40 percent higher than the state average, while rates of gonorrhea are a staggering 50 percent higher. And those are only the diagnosed cases.
“Honestly, I don’t think the young women in Sacramento worry about it,” Lauren, a 22-year-old student from the area, tells Vocativ. “They just want to have fun. They don’t think about the consequences of their actions until they’re faced with them. It scares me that our young generation has become so reckless.” If anything, they find the statistics “embarrassing,” but Lauren hopes that the new free test will urge women to “start taking their health more seriously.” Women, it seems, like the county, presume men are hopeless.
The program, which for now is funded by a grant, may seem like a clever way for disconnected, undersexed government officials to keep the clap in check, but a few dudes are acting righteously indignant, wondering where their own complimentary STD kits are. Others are calling the ladies-only policy sexist, plain and simple.
#mensrights@reddit Sacramento County offering free take home STD tests for women…no free … http://t.co/mjNEEaCCML #Feminism is #HATE
— mensrights reddits (@mensrightsrdt) August 28, 2013
WHAT ABOUT MEN?: County Offers Women Free Home STD Tests As Chlamydia, Gonorrhea 'Spread Like Wildfire' http://t.co/AyyplkluAT
— Robert Whitmore (@rwhitmmx) August 28, 2013
The site does offer a “clinic locator” for men to find ”clinics which can test and treat you for chlamydia and gonorrhea for free or at a low cost” and notes that “most clinics use a sliding scale to make sure you don’t pay more than you can afford.” The county released an app last year, Condom Finder, to help men locate free condom dispensaries, but it could be that a distaste for rubbers is at the root of it all. Plus, guys would then need to drive to these dispensaries. It all sounds exhausting.
Some taxpayers are also infuriated about what they view as the work of a bunch of sex-crazed Sandra Flukes and the Women’s Liberation Front, and they wonder how the program will be funded when the grant runs dry. It’s an ideological debate: Is it OK for the government to pay for something that affects only an isolated demographic, particularly when the issue is so morally controversial? Or could such a program be characterized as a community relief effort when the problem at hand is a quickly spreading communicable disease?
Sacramento County To Offer Home STD Tests For Chlamydia, Gonorrhea..nhttp://cbsloc.al/1dN8aCN Way to go liberal feminists.
— Conservative Woman (@DivineMoments) August 27, 2013
Proof that not only taxpayers get screwed by politicians. Sacramento County has highest Chlamydia, Gonorrhea http://t.co/pPPX641jk0 #tcot
— steveyuhas (@steveyuhas) August 28, 2013
Sacramento County To Offer Home STD Tests For Chlamydia, Gonorrhea..nhttp://cbsloc.al/1dN8aCN Way to go liberal feminists.
— Conservative Woman (@DivineMoments) August 27, 2013
Others have just gone after the usual suspects for spreading “the wildfire” in the first place: sluts, skanks, hoes, whores, and even those recently popular culprits of salacious activity: twerkers.
Don't be a HOOR. Sacramento County To Offer Home STD Tests For Chlamydia, Gonorrhea as infection rates soar. http://t.co/ULgciGrusQ
— Kelly Marie (@flyoverangel) August 28, 2013
Sacramento has the highest STD rate in CA? …I'm fucking disgusted! Close your legs & wrap your shit up you nasty ass bitches!
— ➕IG: daniebaybe (@daniebaybe) August 28, 2013
There must be a lot of twerking going on in Sacramento! #tcot http://t.co/k51nFHtD0p
— PaulaRevere (@paula_carvin) August 27, 2013
#LeftCoast God forbid they say "close your legs" – Sacramento County To Offer Home STD Tests http://t.co/FeS4hAPfNR
— Michael (@rueb86) August 28, 2013
Naturally, there are no accusations being thrown at men for all this disease-trafficking sexy time, but the nature of gonorrhea and chlamydia is that they are transmitted diseases, passed from one partner to another. Statistics, glorious statistics, reveal that a far larger number of young women (specifically black women) have the disease than men, meaning, perhaps, that a small group of Sacto studs are sleeping with a large group of the county’s women.
Public-health officials have many theories for what could be behind the epidemic, but none are conclusive. The popular use of GPS hookup apps, such as Tinder, Grindr and Blender, is a popular suspect.
“We need all the help we can get,” Sacramento Public Health Officer Dr. Olivia Kasirye, told the county’s local CBS station. To make matters worse, for 70 percent of women and even more men, symptoms of both gonorrhea and chlamydia can go unnoticed. Also on the rise: a gonorrhea “super bug,” a drug-resistant strain of the disease that some doctors are calling “worse than AIDS.” The first case was found in Japan in 2009, though the disease was reportedly spotted in Hawaii in 2011, and has since spread to Norway and California.
On Twitter, boys and girls alike are shedding emoji tears.
So much for a wild Labor Day weekend.
The post “Sexism,” “sluts” and Sacramento: Free-STD tests for women-only trigger firestorm appeared first on Vocativ.