According to the CDC, the United States is currently in the midst of a syphilis epidemic, with rates rising 9% in 2022.
The numbers, which come from a new federal government report on sexually transmitted diseases among adults conducted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, do show some good news, however.
The rate of gonorrhea has dropped by 9%. Officials do not know if this decrease is the leading edge of a greater downward trend that has yet to come.
Despite that, the news of an increase in syphilis cases among adults is of greater concern because it is less common but more dangerous than both gonorrhea and chlamydia.
The total cases of syphilis were 207,000 in 2022, the highest number in the United States in 73 years.
Syphilis cases among newborns increased dramatically in 2022. The CDC says syphilis cases greatly impact gay and bisexual men but are expanding among heterosexual men and women.
Syphilis is a bacterial disease that may appear as painless genital sores but can lead to paralysis, hearing loss, dementia and death, if left untreated.
Some Background
Of the 2022 cases of syphilis, 59,000 reportedly involved the most contagious form of the disease. Of those, heterosexual men made up nearly a quarter of the cases while women made up a similar ratio.
"I think its unknowingly being spread in the cisgender heterosexual population because we really aren't testing for it. We really aren't looking for it" in that population, said Dr. Philip Chan, who teaches at Brown University and is chief medical officer of Open Door Health, a health center for gay, lesbian and transgender patients in Providence, Rhode Island.
American Indian and Alaska Native people had the highest rate of infection among any race, ethnic group. South Dakota is the state with the highest rate of infectious syphilis at 84 cases per 100,000 people - more than twice as high as the state with the second-highest rate, New Mexico.
Cases of chlamydia were largely unchanged from 2021 to 2022 at a rate of around 500 cases per 100,000, with declines noted in men and women in their early 20s. For gonorrhea, the decline in new cases among women was the most profound for those in their early 20s.
Rates of gonorrhea declined in 40 states and it is believed that the numbers could be tied to the COVID-19 pandemic. But, whatever the reason, its effect was felt across the nation.
