Victorians living in regional communities will be able to visit a vending machine to test for sexually transmitted infections as part of a 12-month trial.
Two custom-built STI test vending machines will travel across regional Victoria in a bid to improve communities' sexual health, with the first machine operating from Wednesday at Echuca in the state's north.
The trial, led by the University of Melbourne's Department of Rural Health, will place the machines where access to care might be limited.
The machines can be used discreetly at any time.
University of Melbourne professor Jane Tomnay said an annual increase in sexually transmissible infections posed a significant public health concern, particularly for people in rural and regional areas.
“Innovative solutions for health promotion, testing and treatment are urgently needed and this initiative aims to provide accessible options for sexual health testing in communities where mainstream services are lacking," she said.
People will be able to get a test kit within 60 to 90 seconds and send off their specimen to the Melbourne Sexual Health Centre for testing.
The centre will contact anyone requiring treatment.
The transmission of gonorrhoea and syphilis is more common in rural Victoria than in the state's metropolitan areas, government figures show.
Nationally, more than 80,400 STI cases were reported to the National Notifiable Disease Surveillance System in the first six months of 2023, up 23 per cent on the same period last year.
Cases dropped during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in Victoria and NSW, but this year they have already overtaken the 76,341 reported in the first half of 2019.
The STI test vending machines would improve health outcomes, particularly for LGBTQI communities, Indigenous Australians and people aged between 16 and 25, Prof Tomnay said.
The machines are available elsewhere in Brisbane, Adelaide and parts of the United Kingdom.
They were a novel solution for regional and rural Victoria, where communities often grappled with transportation constraints to access care, high costs and lengthy wait times, Prof Tomnay said.
The vending machines will be placed in the Loddon Mallee region at Echuca, Swan Hill and Mildura, and in the Hume region at Shepparton and Wangaratta over the 12-month trial period.
