In Favor of Clinics

Susan Davis, president of the San Diego Unified School District’s Board of Trustees, has expressed her hope that the public will encourage her board to take a second look at the health clinic proposal, which was turned down recently.

This letter is my vote in favor of continuing the task force into the second phase of the study, which would include a needs assessment. It seems very short-sighted to cancel the possibility of a clinic before knowing how much and where it may be needed. The cancellation was apparently a response to a group which opposed a health clinic on the grounds that it might provide information about birth control and dispense contraceptives, matters which they believe should remain solely within the parents’ control.

While the issue of whether a local campus health clinic would indeed provide any reproductive information or services was never decided, it would certainly be the right of those opposing such services to keep their children away from such a clinic. But is it their right to deprive others of services which they may want, need and not be getting anywhere else in our society?

The health clinics have proven successful in many other cities across the country. Is San Diego so different from them that it doesn’t have similar problems that the clinics can help? If it is, let the continued study of the task force prove it.

MARION E. DIXON

La Jolla