For 10 years the Women’s Care Center provided “confidential reproductive health care services, Family Planning, and testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections” to Drexel students two nights a week at the Student Health Center as well as other Philadelphians during normal business hours in Center City, according to the Office of Counseling and Health Services website. Their services were provided on a low to no-cost basis based on family size and income. They would do this for people and students without health insurance or those that did not want to use it for confidentiality reasons. They had language-specific care meant for refugees and immigrants who may not even know their healthcare rights, but still deserve them. Basically this center was one that promoted equality for all regardless of income, status, or family biases.
This past summer these services stopped being offered at Drexel’s Student Health Center, but continued to be offered in Center City at the Women’s Care Center.
But according to an automated message heard when you call the number of the center, on August 29th, 2019 the Women’s Care Center announced that they would no longer offered OBGYN services because of the closing of Hahnemann Hospital. They would no longer do prescription refills, and patients would have to find a new physician themself if they wanted future care. According to a friend with prior experience at the clinic, they notified former patients via a notice in the mail of this center’s closing. This means that not only would the center not be accessible in the Student Health Center, but it would also not be available in Center City to anyone, including the vulnerable populations that it worked hard to serve before.
Image courtesy of UNFPA
This means that Drexel University College of Medicine no longer has a center specifically for women’s health services. While Drexel still offers these services to students with insurance, there are other external costs that some people cannot afford. At the Student Health Center, students who are on their family’s health insurance will inevitably have to tell their parents what is going on. Because of the stigma surrounding women’s sexuality, women may not want to tell their parents that they are sexually active. This can lead to higher rates of unprotected sex as well as higher rates of STIs and unplanned pregnancies. The Women’s Care Center provided these things for women without the shame that may come along with it elsewhere.
Women’s health is one of the most important parts of a well-functioning society. Access to reproductive health and education services allow women to become more informed about their bodies, so that they can make appropriate decisions for themselves. According to the Guttmacher Institute, when women can plan their pregnancies they can complete their education, participate more fully in the workforce, have increased productivity, and ultimately earn more money. This not only helps women, but economically and socially helps everybody.
Cutting the Women’s Care Center may make sense to Drexel in terms of their own budget and with the closing of Hahnemann, but in every other aspect it is illogical. This is a great time to remind everyone that Drexel is a business above all else. They will reduce access to our basic rights and the basic rights of our community if it means that they can save a dime. They know it’s wrong, or else they would’ve publicly announced that it was happening instead of obscuring all information about it online. While surface-level information about the Care Center is still available on Drexel’s website, the links for further information lead you nowhere because it no longer exists.
Images courtesy of Drexel
These are our rights. We should care about them not just for ourselves but for everyone in our community. Just because someone is an immigrant or doesn’t have health insurance doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t have access to a healthy lifestyle. If Drexel is really committed to “solving real problems and making a difference in the lives of our students and our neighbors,” as the university’s values state on their website, then they would acknowledge this issue and actively try to reopen the Women’s Care Center.