Chlamydia cases reach a record

Chlamydia cases in Utah mirror a national climb that has public health officials concerned.

More than 1 million cases of chlamydia were reported in the United States last year — the most ever reported for a sexually transmitted disease, federal health officials said Tuesday during release of an annual report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on chlamydia, syphilis and gonorrhea.

"A new U.S. record," said Dr. John M. Douglas Jr. of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In Utah, where the trend has been upward for several years, there are already 4,660 chlamydia cases in 2007, the vast majority diagnosed in people ages 15 to 24.

Chlamydia is the most common of the three diseases, caused by the bacterium chlamydia trachomatis. Nearly 1,031,000 cases were reported nationally last year, up from 976,000 the year before. Besides sexual transmission, it also can be passed by a mother to her baby during childbirth. Detected early, it's easily treated.

Chlamydia is not the only source of bad news regarding sexually transmitted diseases, both nationally and locally. Gonorrhea rates are jumping again after hitting a record low, and an increasing number of cases are caused by a "superbug" version resistant to common antibiotics, federal officials said Tuesday.

Syphilis is rising, too. The rate of congenital syphilis — which can deform or kill babies — rose for the first time in 15 years.

"Hopefully we will not see this turn into a trend," said Dr. Khalil Ghanem, an infectious diseases specialist at Johns Hopkins University's School of Medicine.

There were about 349 cases of chlamydia per 100,000 people in 2006 in the United States, up 5.6 percent from the 329 per 100,000 rate in 2005. In Utah, the 2006 rate was 197 cases per 100,000, a climb from a rate of 182 the year before. Tim Lane, manager of the Utah Department of Health STD Control Program, said Utah health officials have received reports of about 300 more cases so far this year than at the same time last year.

Most public health officials believe the larger number is not a pure increase in cases, but rather a reflection that more people are being tested for chlamydia, which in as many as 75 percent of cases has no symptoms but can do long-term, serious harm, including causing infertility. CDC and other health officials say all sexually active women should be screened each year for chlamydia.