More than 600,000 Americans contract Gonorrhea each year

More than 600,000 Americans contract Gonorrhea each year. As if that statistic wasn’t alarming enough, scientists at the CDC are now showing evidence that some strains of Gonorrhea are becoming resistant to the usual antibiotics used to treat it. At this time, the infection is treated with third generation Cephalosporin , but the effectiveness of using cephalosporins for treating Gonorrhea is diminishing rapidly.
According to Judith N. Wasserheit, professor and vice chair of the department of global health at the University of Washington and co-author of a new perspective published in the New England Journal of Medicine. ,
““Though there is no evidence yet of treatment failures in the United States, trends in decreased susceptibility coupled with a history of emerging resistance and reported treatment failures in other countries point to a likelihood of failures on the horizon and a need for urgent action.”
Gonorrhea is the second most common communicable disease in the United States. Scientists have noted that Neisseria gonorrhoeae has always readily developed resistance to antimicrobial agents.
Gonorrhea developed resistance to sulfanilamide in the 1940’s, penicillin and tetracyclines in the 1980’s, and then fluoroquinolones by 2007. Now treatments options are limited by the CDC to third-generation cephalosporins. Currently there are no other drug options available.
The most prominent increases in drug susceptibility to Gonorrhea are in the west and among men who have sex with men (MSM). These higher-risk populations are showing demographic patterns that mirror those observed when Gonorrhea became resistant to fluoropuinolone, putting them at risk.
A simple urine test is often all that is needed to detect Gonorrhea in a person’s system. Gonorrhea often has no symptoms, but typical symptoms include burning urination, genital discharge, and pain during intercourse.
If left untreated, Gonorrhea can cause irreversible damage to internal organs and cause infertility.

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