Antibiotics Overuse During COVID-19 Triggers Spike In Sexual Disease: Report

New Delhi: The excessive use of antibiotics during the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a rise in cases of gonorrhoea, a sexually transmitted infection (STI).

According to media reports, experts fear that the highly drug resistant STI may even become untreatable.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) clearly states that cases of gonorrhoea may become even more resistant to the recommended treatments like azithromycin, which has seen an increase in usage during the pandemic, Business Today reported quoting a British media report.

“Such a situation can fuel the emergence of resistance in gonorrhoea including gonorrhoea superbug (super gonorrhea) with high-level resistance to current antibiotics recommended to treat it,” a WHO spokesperson told British media outlet The Sun.

Kevin Cox, Executive Chairman of the Britain-based start-up Biotaspheric Limited, stated that new treatments are urgently needed for gonorrhoea as people who are infected “will infect others and accelerate microbial resistance”.

The US-based Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said cases of gonorrhoea have increased 63 per cent since 2014. The US agency has also warned that this could “facilitate transmission of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)”.