The Trouble with Gonorrhea

Doctors have been disappointed more than once in their high hopes of eradicating gonorrhea with wonder drugs, but last week the U.S. Public Health Service reported that before the end of 1963 the anti-gonorrhea campaign may be made vastly more effective. This time it is not a new drug that is arousing new hope, but an improved and speedier way of detecting the disease.

No Immunity. Though gonorrhea is less dramatic than syphilis in its crippling and death-dealing powers, it is not to be taken lightly. It not only produces painful symptoms, but also can cause sterility, blindness in the newborn, crippling arthritis and fatal heart disease. And to public health crusaders trying to stamp out all venereal disease, gonorrhea presents some special problems. It is twice as prevalent as syphilis in the U.S., with about 250,000 cases reported annually and an estimated 1,250,000 unreported. It is much more highly contagious than syphilis, and easier to catch from a single indiscretion. The infection, even when effectively cured, confers no immunity. Repeated infections are the rule. The same victim can catch the dis ease again a few days after being cured --and often does.

Despite these difficulties, gonorrhea can be conquered, said Dr. William J. Brown of PHS's Communicable Disease Center, if only it can be detected promptly and surely. With a man, this is no problem once he goes to a doctor. In a woman, the gonococci may spread and hide, or mingle with other germs to make diagnosis extremely difficult. In the new detection method described by Dr. Brown, the gonococci are made fluorescent and visible through a microscope under ultraviolet light only a few minutes after a smear is taken from a patient. Hospitals across the U.S. are now testing the test, and by the end of the year it should be ready for general use.

Massive Medication. Although VD researchers are still arguing over whether some strains of the gonococcus are now resistant to penicillin, cure is almost certain if the treatment is intensive enough. To give the germs no chance. PHS experts recommend minimal doses of 1,200,000 to 2,400,000 units of penicillin for simple cases of gonorrhea and as much as 20 million units a day for such serious complications as gonorrheal arthritis and heart infection. For the few patients who cannot tolerate penicillin, several other antibiotics are almost as good.

The World Health Organization has glumly reported "complete failure to control gonorrhea in spite of the very widespread use of antibiotics," but in the U.S., and other well-doctored countries, the available drugs and the new test should turn the tide. Elsewhere, the organization fears, the only hope lies in a protective vaccine, and none is yet in sight.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.