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N.S. commits $2.8 million annually to hire 13 more sexual violence trauma therapists

Sarah Rodimon (left), executive director of the Halifax-based Avalon Sexual Assault Centre and Brian Comer, Nova Scotia’s minister responsible for the Office of Addictions and Mental Health are seen in Halifax on Wednesday, July 27, 2022. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Keith Doucette

The Halifax-based Avalon Sexual Assault Centre is getting $2.8 million in annual provincial funding over the next five years to help increase access to its trauma services for sexual assault survivors.

The money will help the centre hire another 13 sexual violence trauma therapists by next March.

The new hires will more than double the number of trauma therapists in the province to 24 from 11, and four of those spots will be designated for African Nova Scotians and Indigenous health-care workers.

Read more: Nova Scotia domestic violence survivors spending longer in shelters due to housing crisis

Sarah Rodimon, Avalon’s executive director, says the new therapists will work across the province, adding that the location of each new position has not been determined.

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Rodimon says the main goals of the sexual assault centre are to offer care more quickly to victims and to reach people in areas of the province where trauma services are limited.

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Among the areas with limited services are rural, Indigenous and African Nova Scotian communities.

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