Chlamydia is the most common sexually transmitted infection (STI) in Australia, particularly among young people aged between 15 and 25 years. You can reduce your risk of getting chlamydia by practising safe sex, and limiting your sexual partners.
Human Papillomavirus (HPV) Infection
HPV is the most common STI in the United States, but most people with the infection have no symptoms.
Experts agree that for chlamydia, most of the increase can be attributed to diagnostic testing. Advances in technology have created more accurate tests, which have helped to identify more infection. The number of tests conducted has increased over time as well.
Herpes is easy to catch. All it takes is skin-to-skin contact, including areas that a condom doesn't cover. You're most contagious when you have blisters, but you don't need them to pass the virus along. Because herpes is a virus, you can't cure it.
The most dangerous viral STD is human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which leads to AIDS. Other incurable viral STDs include human papilloma virus (HPV), hepatitis B and genital herpes.
The risk of contracting chlamydia is highest among young Australians aged 15-29. Gonorrhoea is an STI affecting 68 in every 100,000 Australians, with the rates higher in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations and highest in remote areas.
Of these, 4 are currently curable: syphilis, gonorrhoea, chlamydia and trichomoniasis. The other 4 are incurable viral infections: hepatitis B, herpes simplex virus (HSV), HIV and human papillomavirus (HPV).
Trichomoniasis (or “trich”) is the most common of the curable STIs. The organism Trichomonas vaginalis is a parasite which lives in the lower genital tract and is generally transmitted through sexual intercourse.
About 16 per cent of Australians report having an STI at some point in their lifetime — that's roughly 4 million people. With the exceptions of hepatitis and HIV, Australia's most common STIs are on the rise.
Women are also biologically more vulnerable to STDs than are men. Women are more susceptible to STDs during sexual intercourse because the vaginal surface is larger and more vulnerable to sexual secretions than the primarily skin-covered penis.
You are at risk of getting an STI if: you don't use condoms during sex or dental dams (a thin latex square held over the vaginal or anal area during oral sex) you have changed sex partners or had more than one sex partner in the last 12 months.
Symptoms can occur within 2-14 days after infection. However, a person may have chlamydia for months, or even years, without knowing it.
Although chlamydia is highly contagious, it does not always transmit to a person's sexual partners. It is also possible to have a false-negative test result. Having more frequent sex with a partner who has chlamydia may increase a person's risk of contracting it.
What is late-stage chlamydia? Late-stage chlamydia refers to an infection that has spread to other parts of the body. For example, it may have spread to the cervix (cervicitis), testicular tubes (epididymitis), eyes (conjunctivitis), or throat (pharyngitis), causing inflammation and pain.
Syphilis is rare in Australia, but the numbers are increasing, especially in men who have sex with men and young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people living in Queensland, Northern Territory, Western Australia and South Australia.
The report said international studies showed the rates of sexual diseases in the United States exceeded those of every other developed country. It noted, for example, that gonorrhea infects 150 of every 100,000 Americans, compared with 3 of every 100,000 people in Sweden and 18.6 per 100,000 in Canada.
The risk of getting an STD significantly increases with unprotected sex. Without using barrier methods for protection, the likelihood of contracting STDs such as chlamydia, gonorrhea, or syphilis can reach up to 30% during sexual encounters with an infected individual.
Gonorrhea has progressively developed resistance to the antibiotic drugs prescribed to treat it. Following the spread of gonococcal fluoroquinolone resistance, the cephalosporin antibiotics have been the foundation of recommended treatment for gonorrhea.
Syphilis, like HIV, is a potentially fatal disease. Syphilis differs from HIV in two distinct ways, though. First, syphilis typically takes a long time to seriously threaten someone's health. A person might have the disease for thirty years before they begin to face issues like internal bleeding or paralysis.
Several common STDs like chlamydia and gonorrhea can cause discharge from the genitals. Occasionally, this discharge may have a pungent smell associated with it, but more often than not, this isn't the case. Rather, trichomoniasis is the STD that most often produces foul-smelling discharge.