Super gonorrhea cases uncovered in the U.S.
NEW YORK – Two cases of an antibiotic-resistant strain of gonorrhea have been diagnosed in Massachusetts.
“It’s quite concerning,” Dr. Rabia De Latour from NYU Langone Health says.
The sexually transmitted disease is creating mutations to help it avoid the effects of antibiotics. The fear is that the new strains are in circulation beyond a point where they can be contained.
Related: Super gonorrhea uncovered in U.K.
“It’s been termed super gonorrhea because it’s resistant to at least, at least somewhat resistant, to at least five different types of antibiotics,” Dr. De Latour says.
Patients that used to be able to be treated with pills now need to be treated with antibiotics via IV.
“It’s a huge threat to global health and it’s something that we need to address.”
The two cases were ultimately cured with ceftriaxone, the lone remaining treatment recommended for gonorrhea.
We have been using and in some cases abusing antibiotics for the last 70 years and this is, again, just a natural evolution of bacteria and viruses and other infectious diseases,” Dr. De Latour says. “They want to survive.”
Get breaking news alerts in the free FOX5NY News app! | Sign up for FOX 5 email newsletters
That means that we could be entering a post-antibiotic era because little has been done to develop new treatments.
“It’s a huge threat to global health and it’s something that we need to address,” Dr. De Latour says.
