A new gonorrhea strain has been found in Japan that is apparently resistant to all known antibiotics. The strain, named H041, is similar to the other strains of the sexually transmitted disease yet unlike ones in the U.S. this one is incurable and can cause serious damage in both men and women including infertility and increased risk for contraction of HIV.
For years the Center for Disease Control has warned that gonorrhea strains were becoming resistant to traditional treatments and now unfortunately the fears have been justified.
"This is both an alarming and a predictable discovery," Dr. Magnus Unemo said in a statement about H041. Unemo, based at the Swedish Reference Laboratory for Pathogenic Neisseria, worked with Japanese colleagues to characterize the new H041 multidrug-resistant gonorrhea strain.
Gonorrhea spreads through sexual contact and is extremely widespread in the U.S. and the world with around 700,000 new cases every year in the United States and an estimated 350 million globally. The infection can often have little to no symptoms which is one of the reasons it spreads so fast throughout communities.
This is yet another warning to sexually active people to play safe and be educated. Gonorrhea is very preventable if protection is used. Up to 99.9 percent.
