Sharp increase of gonorrhea in Norway

Hand with condoms in bedHand with condoms in bed.Photo: Sara Johannessen / SCANPIX

Number of registered persons with gonorrhea in Norway is almost quintupled over the past decade, according to figures from the Public Health
Last year 1096 persons were diagnosed for gonorrhea in Norway against 851 cases in 2015. According to Public Health, the number of registered persons with gonorrhea in Norway were almost quintupled over the past ten years.

Particularly strong the increase of gonorrhea has been among women in Norway, where reported cases have quadrupled in a few years.

– Number of affected people in the general population have now reached a stage where we fear that we can once again be faced with a more extensive spread of gonorrhea in Norway as they are now experiencing in many other countries, including Denmark and Sweden, says Øivind Nilsen, senior advisor at NIPH.

Out of the 1096 cases, there were 876 men and 220 women. Among men, there were 598 infected homosexuals, while 276 were infected heterosexually. The increase of gonorrhea in 2016 is seen especially in Oslo and Akershus.

In Norway in Oslo most women and men become infected. The most frequent infection site abroad for men was Thailand for heterosexual men and Germany and Spain for gays.

30 women were infected abroad, and they were infected in 22 different countries. Frequent infections countries were Turkey with five cases.

– Antibiotic Resistant gonococci is a rapidly growing problem, and internationally, there is great concern for the resistance situation in light of the increasing incidence of gonorrhea, says Nilsen.

Also in Norway, it is already found instances gonorrhea bacteria which has developed resistance to current standard treatment.

 

Source: NTB scanpix / Norway Today