Trichomoniasis: a common STD in young US adults
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More than 2 percent of young adults in the United States have a sexually transmitted disease (STD) called trichomoniasis—including more than 10 percent of young black women, according to a new report.
Trichomoniasis, a parasitic infection caused by Trichomonas vaginalis, “is more common than we usually think,” Dr. William C. Miller from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, told Reuters Health. “We need to consider routinely testing young adults.”
Although many persons with trichomoniasis have only mild symptoms or no symptoms at all, the infection can cause significant illness. Trichomoniasis is estimated to cost the US more than 34 million dollars annually in direct medical care costs.
“Because the potential consequences of this infection are significant, greater efforts are needed to reduce the prevalence,” Miller and colleagues explain in the journal Sexually Transmitted Diseases. “The minimal attention given to trichomoniasis in screening and reporting may contribute to this high prevalence.”
Miller and associates used data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) to estimate the prevalence of trichomoniasis in the United States among nearly 20,000 young adults.
Among the 12,449 specimens they tested for T. vaginalis, 2.3 percent were positive.
Women were 64 percent more likely than men to be infected, and the prevalence in the south (2.8 percent) was twice that in the west (1.4 percent).
For men and women, the results indicate, the prevalence was significantly higher for those 25 years of age or older than among 18 to 20 year olds.
Trichomonas was considerably more prevalent among blacks (6.9 percent) and Native Americans (4.1 percent) than among whites (1.2 percent), the researchers observe, and prevalences were intermediate in Latinos (2.1 percent) and Asians (1.8 percent).
The highest rates were seen in black (10.5 percent) and Native American (4.2 percent) women. White men had the lowest prevalence (1.3 percent).
Very few men (2.3 percent) or women (2.0 percent) reported any symptoms associated with trichomoniasis.
Trichomoniasis was associated with a significantly higher prevalence of chlamydial infection, the investigators report. Nearly 13 percent of patients with trichomoniasis also had chlamydial infection, compared with an overall chlamydial prevalence of only 4.2 percent.
Miller said: “It is important to remember that the most fundamental risk factor for any sexually transmitted infection is the presence of the infection in a sexual partner. Consequently, higher prevalence in subgroups leads, in and of itself, to increased risk of acquisition, because sexual partners are more likely to be infected.”
SOURCE: Sexually Transmitted Diseases, October 2005.
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