WHO reports more than 1 million new curable sexually transmitted infections every day
According to a release from the World Health Organization (WHO), every day, there are more than 1 million new cases of curable sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among people aged 15 to 49 years. WHO says this amounts to more than 376 million new cases annually of four infections - chlamydia, gonorrhea, trichomoniasis, and syphilis.
Since the last published WHO data for 2012, there has been no substantive decline in either the rates of new or existing infections. On average, approximately 1 in 25 people globally have at least one of these STIs, according to the latest figures, with some experiencing multiple infections at the same time.
“We’re seeing a concerning lack of progress in stopping the spread of sexually transmitted infections worldwide,” said Dr. Peter Salama, Executive Director for Universal Health Coverage and the Life-Course at WHO, in the statement. “This is a wake-up call for a concerted effort to ensure everyone, everywhere can access the services they need to prevent and treat these debilitating diseases.”
Published online by the Bulletin of the World Health Organization, the research shows that among men and women aged 15 to 49 years of age, there were 127 million new cases of chlamydia in 2016, 87 million cases of gonorrhea, 6.3 million cases of syphilis and 156 million cases of trichomoniasis.
If untreated these infections can lead to serious and chronic health effects that include neurological and cardiovascular disease, infertility, ectopic pregnancy, stillbirths, and increased risk of HIV. WHO says they are also associated with significant levels of stigma and domestic violence.
Syphilis alone caused an estimated 200 000 stillbirths and newborn deaths in 2016, making it one of the leading causes of baby loss globally.
STIs spread predominantly through unprotected sexual contact, including vaginal, anal and oral sex. Some - including chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis - can also be transmitted during pregnancy and childbirth, or, in the case of syphilis, through contact with infected blood or blood products, and injecting drug use.
WHO says timely and affordable testing and treatment are crucial for reducing the burden of STIs globally, alongside efforts to encourage people who are sexually active to get screened for STIs. WHO further recommends that pregnant women should be systematically screened for syphilis as well as HIV.
All bacterial STIs can be treated and cured with widely available medications. However, recent shortages in the global supply of benzathine penicillin has made it more difficult to treat syphilis. Rapidly increasing antimicrobial resistance to gonorrhea treatments is also a growing health threat and may lead eventually to the disease being impossible to treat.
Published in the WHO Bulletin as an ‘online first’, the data provides the baseline for monitoring progress against the Global Health Sector Strategy on STIs, 2016–2021. The strategy, adopted by the World Health Assembly in May 2016, proposed rapid scale-up of evidence-based interventions and services to end STIs as a public health concern by 2030.
