Haight Ashbury Free Clinic Closes Its Doors After More Than 50 Years
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) - An icon of 60s-era street medicine in San Francisco, is a thing of the past.
The Haight Ashbury Free Clinic opened its doors as the first free medical clinic in the country in 1967. Now, some 52 years later, it is closing its doors.
The free clinic first opened on June 7, 1967, during the Summer of Love when thousands of youth flooded San Francisco. Providing medical, psychiatric and substance-abuse treatment free of charge, it served as a model for similar clinics across the country.
Two other free clinics in San Francisco, HealthRIGHT 360 and its affiliate program, Tenderloin Health Services, will close down in October.
The closures are blamed on neighborhood changes, competition and rising rent.
At the end of the transition, there will only be one Health-Right 360 at its Mission Street location. The Berkeley Free Clinic will remain open.
Free clinics were emblematic of 60s counterculture, promoting the value of healthcare as a human right.
