Why Sex-Related Infections Are Spreading Again

Sexually transmitted infections, or STIs, are rebounding in rich countries after being firmly in retreat for decades. Syphilis, for example, can cause stillbirths and infant deaths, and years later can lead to blindness, dementia or paralysis. The resurgence is a result of multiple factors including inconsistent condom usage and the abuse of illicit recreational drugs. At the same time, some common STIs, such as gonorrhea and shigellosis, are becoming harder to treat because of antibiotic resistance. In the U.S., which has the highest rates of sexually transmitted disease in the developed world, the crisis is costing an estimated $16 billion annually in preventable health-care expenses.

In the U.S., cases of chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis -- three of the most common, treatable sexually transmitted diseases -- jumped by about 10% in 2017 to almost 2.3 million, a record. With syphilis, the annual rate of reported cases in the U.S. has almost doubled in recent years, to 31.4 cases per 100,000 people in 2017 from 15.9 per 100,000 in 2012. The trend with syphilis has also been seen in such countries as France, Belgium, Ireland and the U.K. Reported cases of gonorrhea roughly doubled from 2013 to 2017 in Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Norway, Spain and Sweden. The number of diagnoses in England jumped 26% to a 40-year high last year.