Wyndham has the lowest rate of pap screening among women living in Melbourne’s west.
According to new statistics, it also has soaring numbers of sexually transmitted infections.
Figures from Women’s Health West, released as part of a four-year plan to improve sexual health in the west, show that less than half of women aged 20 to 69 in Wyndham had a pap test in the three years to 2011, with the city recording the lowest screening rates in the western suburbs for women aged between 25 and 69.
Across the west, the average screening rate for all women was 53 per cent.
In Wyndham, 49.3 per cent of women were tested from 2009-11.
Wyndham also recorded the second- highest rates of chlamydia and gonorrhoea cases in the western suburbs during 2011. The city had 521 cases of chlamydia, up from 287 in 2008, and 58 notifications of gonorrhoea, up from 34.
Women’s Health West chief executive Robyn Gregory said the west was lagging behind the rest of the state on a range of sexual and reproductive health indicators.
“Sexually active young people are less likely to report practising safe sex wIth a condom, and our cervical screening rates are significantly lower than the state average,”
Dr Gregory said.
Women’s Health West health promotion co-ordinator Elly Taylor said a lack of knowledge was underpinning rising STI rates.
“Newly arrived migrants may not know what’s available,” she said. “Some come to Australia with poor health outcomes in place.
“But this is a problem across the board – it’s not just exclusive to migrants and refugees.”
