Gonorrhea As the Next Superbug

WrongSizeGlass writes "Reuters is reporting that Gonorrhea risks becoming a superbug: 'The sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea risks becoming a drug-resistant "superbug" if doctors do not devise new ways of treating it, a leading sexual health expert said.'"

Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only are you dull, but you are an idiot too. It does not take doing a ho to get it. This is no different than HIV. IOW, it is not who you screw, but who the person 5 removed from you that had it and passed it on. And as to you knowing whether you have it or not, I seriously doubt that you have a clue.

No one loves you when you have the...

[Anonymous Coward]

When I was a sexually active youth (back in the 60's and 70's) I managed to get the clap at least 3 times. The first time, I was in Mexico. I went to the pharmacy and got a lot of oral penicillin. Dosed myself with a couple of million units a day for a week or two. Bingo - cured. The next time, I was in the US and went to my family doctor. He prescribed some new "stronger" antibiotic for it. Guess what - it didn't work! I went back to the massive "beat it to death" penicillin doses and cured it post haste. The last time I got it, I went to the P-cure again. Two weeks, gone.

Frankly, I don't think most doctors know what they are doing when it comes to dealing with this cruft. They are the reason why we are getting these "super bugs". It's a matter of "try a little of this, and if that doesn't work, try a little of that". As a result, both "this" and "that" make the little buggers stronger. My philosophy when it comes to infections - hit them hard and don't let up until they are dead, dead, dead!

Re:What?

[TerranFury]

You know, I wish that somehow "I didn't feel like using method X" weren't counted as failure or improper use in the contraceptive-effectiveness stats. If it weren't, then abstinence would of course be considered 100% effective, but the condom stats would also be a heck of a lot better. As it is, the commonly-cited condom effectiveness stats are all screwed up and seem pretty worthless because, since they don't differentiate between failure of the condom itself, actual improper use, and just not bothering occasionally to use one (which euphemistically gets called "improper use," but I say that's bullshit), I get the impression that they overstate the risk.

You're not far off, actually!

[WheelDweller]

A few weeks back Slashdot ran a story about MRSA and other 'superbugs' being fought in (I believe it was) Finland.

The cool thing about it is, for at least a decade they've been using the same level of sanitation as 50 years ago: steam-cleaning the floors and walls, not using HAND SANITIZER all the time, and letting the place remain a bit "dirtier" than our own hospitals. THEY HAVE THE LOWEST NUMBER OF SUCH CASES.

It makes sense; let the lesser-bugs go, kill with dumber, more-trusted ways that kill ALL the bugs or none at all, and the superbugs have to mate with lesser-bugs. This bleeds out the specialty features.

Meanwhile, everytime someone shakes hands in America, they hit it again with the sanitizer. It's just a never-ending "Germ Olympics" where only the strongest survive.

We really need to consider 'alternative' means like this, and I think you've hit the penis on the head! :>

probiotics for the vagina

[nido]

When I was at the Natural Food store the other day, I noticed a probiotic in the refridgerator display called femdophilus [jarrow.com]. This product has two strains of lactic acid-producing bacteria that are well suited to colonizing the vagina.

Here's another one: http://www.gynophilus.ca/ [gynophilus.ca]

I have an anecdote about conventional medical thought on bacteria, fungi, and the vagina. I took a late trip home a few months back, and Loveline came on the radio. I listened fairly regularly a long time ago, so I 'tuned in' for old times' sake.

One caller asked Dr. Drew what he could do about his new girlfriend's horrible vaginal odor. Dr. Drew & Crew were like, "what can you do? Bacterial Vaginosis is hard to treat. Don't say anything."

A later caller wanted to know what she could do about recurrent yeast infections. She'd tried any number of pharmaceutical anti-fungal medications, but the yeast didn't give up.

Knowing a bit about so-called "alternative" medical technology, I picked up the cell phone and called. While I was on hold, another caller came on to say that she had good luck with dealing with teh yeast by using only polyester underwear.

I asked Dr. Drew if it was safe to use yogurt in the vagina. He was like, "sure, but why bother? It's not going to help. These people have tried the most powerful antifungals available, and still have problems. What can yogurt do that drugs cannot?" (this was his sentiment, if not the exact wording).

While Yogurt is a sub-optimal probiotic solution, at least it's getting to the root of the problem. Yeast infections and bacterial vaginosis are caused when "bad" bacterial and fungi are able to establish themselves. No matter how many of these "bad" bacteria/fungi the antibiotic/antifungal is able to take out (99.9999% is not enough), the survivors will be able to quickly reestablish themselves once the pills are stopped.

In alternative medical thinking, "good" bacteria are used to coat the digestive system / skin / vagina with a protective film. When "bad" bacteria come along, there's no room available, so they can't establish a colony.

I don't know if there's been any research about probiotics & gonorrhea. But it'd be an interesting study...

here's an article about probiotics & Urinary tract infections: Specific probiotic strains are effective for genitourinary infections [findarticles.com], Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients, Nov, 2006 by Alan R. Gaby