Gonorrhea and Chlamydia rates out of control

Gonorrhea and Chlamydia are very common sexually transmitted diseases in the United States.  In fact, Chlamydia is the most commonly reported notifiable disease in the United States.  Most commonly, these disease are spread by unprotected sexual intercourse.  So how common are they?

According to the CDC, in 2010 there were a total of 1,307,893 cases of chlamydia reported in the United States.  This accounts for 426 cases out of 100,000 population and an increase of 5.1% over the period 1990-2010.  Gonorrhea came in as the second most common STD with 334,826 cases in 2012.  The rate increased 4.1% since 2011 but decreased 2.9% between 2008-2012.  These numbers are staggering!

These numbers may be rising in part due to the fact that we have better screening techniques to detect these diseases.  At a doctor's visit, most adolescents and young adults will be recommended to have a screening exam for these diseases as long as they are agreeable to it.  There are two types of testing: urine and swab.  The urine test is for males and females and results are available within 1 to 2 days.  The swab can be used for women when they are already having a PAP smear.

The problem is that those in their teens or twenties are either not seeing a doctor for symptoms, not being screened during routine visits, or are not taking their treatment medication.  Treating these two diseases is not especially difficult as we have very effective antibiotics against them.  Both the patient and their partner must be treated to prevent spread of the disease between individuals.

I think the battle we are losing is prevention.  We are noticing that people are sexually active at a younger age now and with more partners.  When we couple that with lack of protection or incorrect use of protection, we are headed for trouble.  High schools still offer sex education, but the problem continues to grow.  The responsibility is that of parents and the youth themselves.  Parents must be ready to have those difficult conversations regularly as their children continue to grow.  They should also ask that their children get tested and make it easy for them to do so by allowing them to speak to the doctor privately.  Although privacy in STD transmitting is required by law, some parents try to stay in the room with their children when the doctor asks them to leave to discuss personal matters.  This makes the child uncomfortable and may lead to the child withholding information.

We may never fully eradicate these two diseases, but we have to recognize their wildfire-like spread.  Taking an active role in testing is the only chance we have to make a difference.  Until we make screening for STD's as important as screening for cancers, we will continue to lose this uphill battle.  Spread the word, not the disease.