Nursing at Utopia

Named Utopia by German settlers in the early 1920’s, the lease to Utopia Station was sold in 1970s by the Chalmers Family to the Aboriginal Land Fund Commission and in 1978 the station was claimed under the Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976.

The traditional owners of the Utopia region were displaced from their lands into overcrowded remote communities and fringe camps of major towns during the 1950s and 1960s. In the 1970s, however, they gained freehold title to their land and returned to it, adopting a dispersed way of living in 16 outstations spread over 10,000 square kilometres of country. In re-establishing themselves on their traditional lands, the people of Utopia also set up a community-controlled primary health care service, Urapuntja Council Aboriginal Corporation to provide health care to the outstations.
Located 270 km North East of Alice Springs, Urapuntja (Utopia) clinic provides health services to the Eastern Anmatyarre and Alyawarre people who are the traditional owners of the land. 

The larger community of Alparra, 10 kilometres south of the Utopia Clinic, has a store that sells the usual items found in a small community supermarket, along with hot take away food. Alparra is also where there is a police station that serves the region along with a primary school & a campus of the Batchelor Aboriginal Institute.

Outstation populations can vary from 20 to 100. The Utopia Clinic is situated 10kms north of Alparra & is its own small community with housing available for clinic staff & a small clinic school, which is a primary school whose pupils are drawn from the health workers families of Utopia & some of the surrounding outstations. Be very careful of feral horses, camels, cattle & donkeys when on the road.

Utopia has an extreme desert climate. Summer is hot and winter nights very cold. Utopia is a dry alcohol region. This applies to everyone, including visitorsRead more