Because of budget cuts, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has ended clinical services at seven of its public health clinic sites.<\/p>\n
As of Feb. 27, the county is no longer providing services such as vaccinations, sexually transmitted infection testing and treatment, or tuberculosis diagnosis and specialty TB care at the affected locations, according to county officials and a department fact sheet.<\/p>\n
The sites losing clinical services are Antelope Valley in Lancaster; the Center for Community Health (Leavy) in San Pedro, Curtis R. Tucker in Inglewood, Hollywood-Wilshire, Pomona, Dr. Ruth Temple in South Los Angeles, and Torrance. Services will continue to be provided by the six remaining public health clinics, and through nearby community clinics.<\/p>\n
The changes are the result of about $50 million in funding losses, according to official county statements.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat pushed us to make the very difficult decision to end clinical services at seven of our sites,\u201d said Dr. Anish Mahajan, chief deputy director of the L.A. County Department of Public Health.<\/p>\n
Mahajan said the department selected clinics with relatively lower patient volumes. Over the last month, he said, the department has sent letters to patients about the changes, and referred them to unaffected county clinics, nearby federally qualified health centers or other community providers. According to Mahajan, for tuberculosis patients, particularly those requiring directly observed therapy, public health nurses will continue visiting patients.<\/p>\n
Public health clinics form part of the county\u2019s healthcare safety net, serving low-income residents and those with limited access to care. Officials said that about half of the patients the county currently sees across its clinics are uninsured.<\/p>\n
Mahajan noted that the clinics were established decades ago, before the Affordable Care Act expanded Medi-Cal coverage and increased the number of federally qualified health centers. He said that as more residents gained access to primary care, utilization at some county-run clinics declined.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow that we have a more sophisticated safety net, people often have another place to go for their full range of care,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Still, the closures have unsettled providers who work closely with local vulnerable populations.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hate to see any services that serve our at-risk and homeless community shut down,\u201d said Mark Hood, chief executive of Union Rescue Mission in downtown Los Angeles. \u201cThere\u2019s so much need out there, so it always is going to create hardship for the people that actually need the help the most.\u201d<\/p>\n
Union Rescue Mission does not receive government funding for its healthcare services, Hood said. The mission\u2019s clinics are open not only to shelter guests, up to 1,000 people nightly, but also to people living on the streets who walk in seeking care.<\/p>\n
Its dental clinic alone sees nearly 9,000 patients a year, Hood said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe haven\u2019t seen it yet, but I expect in the coming days and weeks we\u2019ll see more people coming through our doors looking for help,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re going to have to find help somewhere.\u201d Hood said women experiencing homelessness are especially vulnerable when preventive care, including sexual and reproductive health services, becomes harder to access.<\/p>\n
County officials said staffing impacts so far have been managed through reassignment rather than layoffs. Roughly 200 to 300 positions across the department have been eliminated amid funding cuts, officials said, though many were vacant. About 120 employees whose positions were affected have been reassigned; according to Mahajan, no one has been laid off.<\/p>\n
The clinic closures come amid broader fiscal uncertainty. Mahajan said that due to the Trump administration\u2019s \u201cBig Beautiful Bill,\u201d Los Angeles County could lose $2.4 billion over the next several years. That funding, he said, supports clinics, hospitals and community clinic partners now absorbing patients who previously went to the clinics that closed on Feb. 27.<\/p>\n
In response, the L.A. County Board of Supervisors has backed a proposed half-cent sales tax measure that would generate hundreds of millions of dollars annually for healthcare and public health services. Voters are expected to consider the measure in June.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Because of budget cuts, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has ended clinical services at seven…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":365977,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[275],"tags":[12773,680,169967,22863,169971,3071,18,169969,135,475,474,169972,22203,19,17,18985,169968,169970,1595,237,2101],"class_list":["post-365976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-care","tag-clinic","tag-clinical-service","tag-county","tag-county-official","tag-department","tag-eire","tag-full-service-public-health-clinic","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-healthcare-service","tag-help","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-los-angeles-times","tag-mahajan","tag-mark-hood","tag-patient","tag-people","tag-public-health"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116166473978490614","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=365976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365976\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/365977"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=365976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=365976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=365976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}