A Side-Eye to Jacksonville: My Adventure on World AIDS Day

Since December 1st was World AIDS Day, I thought it would be good to go ahead and get tested. Well, apparently Jacksonville had other ideas...

This morning I woke up, had a migraine but was excited to get some work done and get tested. I even called my job and told them I was going to be a little late to allow time to do everything because I already know the wheels turn slower than I'm used to here. I looked up a few clinics that could do testing today. This was probably number one.

While I am aware that these tests cost someone money even if I don't have to pay and the city is no where near eager to budget a lot for HIV testing, could we at least have consistent hours Jacksonville?? I mean, I promise one clinic I looked at was open: Monday and Tuesday from 10:30-12PM and 2PM-3PM and Thursday from 1-5 but only every first and third Thursday and then Friday on..some other weird hours. O_o. Can I get, you know, 8-12 Monday thru Wednesday or something? But, I found a women's health clinic about 20 minutes away that had consistent hours and set out on my way.

So, I get to the clinic which was relatively easy to find but was further away than the directions said plus there was traffic. But I really wanted to get tested so I thought, fine, I'll just be a little later than the original 30 minutes I told my supervisor I would be. I walk in and they tell me they don't do testing at that site anymore, and gave me an address to where the women's clinic had moved. This I don't blame on anyone, they could have possibly just moved or the website hasn't been updated. The address was on the same street, just a different building so I could deal with that right? Wrong....

A brief sidebar about the streets in Jacksonville. One street can run the length of the city, and Jacksonville is freaking huge. They also had this great (O_O) idea of naming cross streets similar names i.e. King St crosses King Rd, ect. Not to mention streets that just randomly end with no warning. It makes for a fun trip when trying to find an out of the way location. Now back to our regularly scheduled program.

The street that both of these clinics are on is looooong. And the women's clinic just happened to move to the opposite end of this street. So I hopped my slightly less enthusiastic tail back in the car and fought the lunch time traffic back to the other end of the street.

I finally find my way to the clinic and walk in, glad I made it but now I'm an hour late for work. I ask the nurse if they do testing (at this point I wasn't trying to take chances). Yes, they did, she said, but you have to make an appointment (the website must have been inaccurate again, as it was listed for walk in appointments. Part of the reason I picked that particular clinic). I asked if I could make an appointment. No, I would have to call in and make an appointment. Also, if I didn't have insurance the test would be $20. I could try and find the Duval County Health Department testing bus, but I'd have to call and see where they were. She gave me the number (which turned out to be the wrong number), and a card to make an appointment at the same office I was standing in. By this time I was about an hour and a half late for work. While my job is understanding, I knew I'd still be getting a strong side eye for saying I was going to be 30 minutes late, only to turn around and show up almost two hours after my shift started.

Here's my point: a lot of women in my city that have to utilize these free clinics do not have a car or an understanding job like I do. So if they got up, struggled to catch public transportation and then after all of that were turned away, do you think they would make much of an effort to try again? The city bus only runs a route about once an hour. So if I got all the way to this clinic and you told me you couldn't test me, I'd have to wait another hour for the next bus to come. Not to mention that the point of coming to a free clinic is because you don't have insurance and probably don't have $20 to spare to take an HIV test.

In addition, a lot of these clinics have a limit as to how many people they will test on a certain day. So, you get on the bus, trek over to this clinic and find out they DO have free testing, but oh you're number 21 and they only test 20 people a day so you're out of luck. Again, how much effort are you going to put into trying to come back if you know chances are it's going to be a wasted trip?

City of Jacksonville, we have to do better. It feels like we are coming up short in providing care for those that want to be responsible, and by doing that, we are only discouraging those that might have gotten tested just because a more responsible peer did. To gain control over the HIV epidemic in Jacksonville, we have to take responsibility for ourselves, and help others who may not otherwise be able to help themselves. When 7500 people are diagnosed daily, testing 20 people a day is not enough.




I am willing to help in any way that I can. Are you?