Illawarra Women's Health Centre general manager Sally Stevenson has welcomed a $35,000 funding boost to help address critical staff shortages.
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And, she is thankful to Shellharbour MP, Anna Watson for lobbying on the centre's behalf, and NSW Minister for Health, Brad Hazzard for providing the one-off funding.
But Ms Stevenson said $35,000 was not nearly enough to help the centre struggling to meet an increasing demand to provide essential services to support women affected by domestic violence and sexual assault.
"I think the funding recognises that there are significant and increasing pressures on women's health centres," she said.
"We've been serving the community for over 30 years but we haven't had any real increase in funding over that time.
"This is despite increasing population, high rates of domestic and family violence and increasing rates of mental illness in the local community.
"These factors coupled with greater demands for the centre in terms of IT, governance, accreditation, and wage increases over this time effectively means, when taking into consideration CPI, that the funding in real terms has gone backwards."
Ms Watson said the Illawarra Women's Health Centre continuously met and exceeded the key performance indicators associated with the NGO Health Partnerships grant program.
"This funding is very well deserved and will go a long way for the centre and for our entire community. I'm so happy to have been able to help an organisation that is helping my community every single day," she said.
Ms Stevenson hoped the one-off funding was an indication the government was considering an increase in recurring funding for the centre.
"At the moment we can't meet demand, some of our waiting lists are two to three months, and these women really need our help," she said.
"But we are still actually keeping many of them out of hospital, or the mainstream health system.
"So really we are a very strong, complimentary health care service in the community but we need to be properly funded to do the work we do."
Agron Latifi
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
