(Image source: National Library of Medicine)
BY STEFANIE REDDING
ANCHOR ANA COMPAIN-ROMERO
You're watching multisource health news analysis from Newsy.
The STI gonorrhea is usually considered an easy fix -- treated with antibiotics related to penicillin.
But that may no longer be the case -- after the discovery of a drug-resistant strain.
They call it H041.
Researchers discovered the variant in a Japanese man.
ABC News has more...
“So it sounds like gonorrhea is becoming a superbug?”
“Uh yes, it is one of the bugs that is very difficult to treat. It has given us a hard time since we first had antibiotics that were available to treat the infection. It has the propensity to adapt and change to whatever we seem to throw at it.”
Gonorrhea is caused by a bacterium that thrives in warm, moist environments.
And while generally not considered fatal -- the National Post explains what could happen without medical attention.
“Untreated, gonorrhea can lead to severe, life-threatening complications if it spreads to the blood and the joints... Untreated women run the risk of developing pelvic inflammatory disease, chronic pelvic pain, and ectopic pregnancies, as well as passing the infection to their babies during birth, which can cause life-threatening infections and blindness.”
Although worldwide transmission rates are unclear, the U.S. Centers for Disease control reports...
“...more than 700,000 persons in the U.S. get new gonorrheal infections each year. Less than half of these infections are reported.”
So what are scientist doing to make sure this new strand of gonorrhea doesn’t become a widespread epidemic?
The BBC spoke to a Swedish pathogen researcher who says -- this problem, concerns the globe.
“[The] World Health Organization has assured us that it will work on the issue of coming up with a global response plan -- a huge challenge for the future … starting with surveillance of the new disease, better infection prevention approach, treatment options such as combining of two or more antibiotics ... and ideally, a vaccine.”
Reports say there haven’t been any cases of the drug-resistant strain aside from the original discovery, but gonorrhea is one of the most common and easily-transmitted STIs in the world.
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