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Free HIV/STD Testing Locations in SWFL

Marcello Casal
/
Agencia Brasil
A woman uses a rapid HIV test.

April is National Sexually Transmitted Disease Awareness Month, and more than a dozen locations in Southwest Florida are offering free STD and HIV testing.

View Free HIV/STD Testing Locations in SWFL in a full screen map.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s most-recent HIV Surveillance Report in 2017, Florida is ranked third in the nation for new cases of HIV diagnosed.  

Miami and Fort Lauderdale have the highest rates for metropolitan statistical areas in the country – with 47 and 40 cases per 100,000 people respectively. The Orlando-Kissimee area is ranked sixth in the nation, and Jacksonville also makes the top 10 at No. 9.

Two years before, the same surveillance report ranked the Cape Coral-Fort Myers region 16th in the U.S. – with 19 cases per 100,000 people.

But, that’s only counting HIV cases. Florida is also seeing a year-after-year rise in chlamydia and gonorrhea cases.

Rachel Iacovone is a reporter and associate producer of Gulf Coast Live for WGCU News. Rachel came to WGCU as an intern in 2016, during the presidential race. She went on to cover Florida Gulf Coast University students at President Donald Trump's inauguration on Capitol Hill and Southwest Floridians in attendance at the following day's Women's March on Washington.Rachel was first contacted by WGCU when she was managing editor of FGCU's student-run media group, Eagle News. She helped take Eagle News from a weekly newspaper to a daily online publication with TV and radio branches within two years, winning the 2016 Society of Professional Journalists Mark of Excellence Award for Best Use of Multimedia in a cross-platform series she led for National Coming Out Day. She also won the Mark of Excellence Award for Feature Writing for her five-month coverage of an FGCU student's transition from male to female.As a WGCU reporter, she produced the first radio story in WGCU's Curious Gulf Coast project, which answered the question: Does SWFL Have More Cases of Pediatric Cancer?Rachel graduated from Florida Gulf Coast University with a bachelor's degree in journalism.