A new shortage of a type of penicillin crucial to the fight against syphilis is alarming infectious disease experts, who warn that a protracted scarcity of the drug could worsen the U.S. epidemic of the sexually transmitted infection.

Syphilis has been on the rise in the United States since 2000, reaching 176,713 cases in 2021, which was an increase of nearly 75 percent since 2017, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Congenital syphilis tripled during that four-year period, to 2,855 cases, including 220 stillbirths or infant deaths. Rates are highest among the infants of Native American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander and Black mothers.

https://dnyuz.com/2023/07/07/antibiotic-shortage-could-worsen-syphilis-epidemic/