Better Testing Finds More STDs
The number of sexually spread diseases is soaring with reported chlamydia cases setting a record, government health officials reported Tuesday.
"The bad news from last year has continued," said Dr. John M. Douglas Jr., director of the CDC’s Division of STD Prevention. "These infections remain at very high levels, and frankly, unacceptably high."
U.S. syphilis rates rose for a seventh year in 2007, driven by gay and bisexual men, while gonorrhea remained at alarming levels especially among blacks.
Blacks make up 12 percent of the U.S. population, but account for about 70 percent of gonorrhea cases and almost half of chlamydia and syphilis cases, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
Thousands of women become infertile each year because of untreated chlamydia and gonorrhea infections, said Douglas.
Black women ages 15 to 19 have the highest rates of chlamydia and gonorrhea, and gonorrhea rates for blacks overall were 19 times higher than for whites, the CDC said.
Chlamydia can infect men as well as women, but rates are nearly three times higher for women. That’s at least partly due to 1993 federal recommendations that emphasize testing for sexually active women age 25 and under.
"Of all the causes of infertility, this is probably the most preventable — since these infections can be prevented, diagnosed and treated," Douglas said
That emphasized screening in recent years is no doubt driving the record numbers, said Dr. Jonathan Zenilman, a professor of infectious diseases at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
"The issue with chlamydia is the more test, the more you’ll find," Zenilman said.
Douglas said to avoid STDs, teens can delay the beginning of sexual activity, people can limit the number of sexual partners and use condoms.
"Condoms have risk-reduction value for every sexually transmitted condition," Douglas said.
The latest numbers translate to a rate of 370 cases per 100,000 people in 2007, up 7.5 percent from 2006.
Syphilis is less common than the others, with 11,466 cases reported in 2007. Rates rose 15 percent from 2006. Syphilis rates dropped by 90 percent in the 1990s to a record low level in 2000, and officials thought it might disappear as a public health threat before its resurgence this decade.
Syphilis has increased each year since 2000 with gay and bisexual men representing 65 percent of cases, the CDC said.
Douglas said many cases are occurring in HIV-positive men who are choosing other HIV-positive men as sexual partners
Sexually transmitted diseases take a significant economic toll.
The CDC estimates that STDs cost the U.S. health-care system an estimated $15.3 billion annually.
Douglas said greater public health campaigns are needed to reverse the trend.
"These diseases can be treated, and we need to have better awareness about how extensive these infections are and what the prevention opportunities are," he said.
Dr. David L. Katz, director of the Yale University School of Medicine Prevention Research Center, said sexually transmitted diseases are a considerable public health burden.
"By serving up crucial details on where and in whom sexually transmitted diseases are most likely, this report helps inform disease-control programs. By highlighting the persistent prevalence of these diseases, it also issues a call to action," he said.
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