There are many positive aspects of sexuality but we need to acknowledge some of the undesirable consequences including sexually transmitted infections and unintended pregnancy. These can be lifelong for individuals, families and communities and we know that those most affected are often economically disadvantaged, ethnic minorities, persons with different sexual orientations, disabled people and young people. Our challenge is to make sure that everyone of any age and background who is at risk should have access to information and services that promote and protect sexual health.

GRASP (Gonococcal Resistance to Antimcrobials Surveillance Programme) is a national sentinel surveillance programme which has monitored trends and drifts in susceptibility in gonococcal isolates since 2000. It collects isolates from consecutive patients attending a network of 26 genitourinary medicine (GUM) clinics that give regional representation in England and Wales. GRASP informed a change in national guidelines in 2002 from ciprofloxacin, the antimicrobial agent of choice, to the third generation cephalosporins, cefixime and ceftriaxone.

SSHA NPC would like to develop the Resources section on the SSHA Website and as a start we are canvassing for a selection of templates for letters, proformas and information slips that Sexual Health Advisers have developed and regularly use.

Since July this year, 14 cases have been identified in the Greater Manchester area, predominantly among men who have sex with men aged between 30-50 years. In addition, since May 2011, five cases of this illness have been reported in the London area in men who have sex with men.

Sexual health charities Brook and FPA have launched the first ever UK Sexual Health Awards. Showcasing some of the best, creative and innovative work in sexual health, the Awards are expected to attract hundreds of nominations from individuals and organisations keen to win recognition at the Awards ceremony in March 2012. The Awards will be hosted by one of Britain’s best-loved TV presenters, Davina McCall, who has constantly supported the work of sexual health charities.

The standards were developed following a 12-week consultation period, details of which can be found within the standards introduction. All comments received throughout the consultation period were collated and presented to the project group and subgroups during the finalisation meetings. A summary of the consultation comments, along with the decisions made during the finalisation phase has been provided within the Consultation Summary Report for the Draft HIV Standards. This report is available to download.

The proposed BASHH Statement on Partner Notification has been posted on the BASHH website for consultation.To help

Gill has been a Nurse Consultant Sexual Health Adviser in Sheffield since 2004. She has served on SSHA NPC from 2001 – 2007 as a Regional Representative (2001-2), Conference Organiser (2002-3) President (2003-4) Research Officer (2004-5) Education Officer (2005-7).

n April 2011 the UKPHR opened the public health practitioner route to the register, in order to become a registered practitioner you have to apply through a UKPHR quality assured local assessment and verification scheme, and we are encouraging the development of more schemes and recently ran a webinar to help to explain the process.

The previous quarter has been quite busy with finalisation of this year’s conference. We are still awaiting around £825 to come in order to finalise any profit. This has been a successful period with lots of interest in attending conference in Cardiff and good numbers maintained even though we had some late cancellations. The interest I believe is due to the reasonable cost to delegates of attending and acting on the feedback when we asked members what they wanted from conference.