Health News: The 'New' STD Is Often Asymptomatic
For many years, researchers have studied the various infections revolving around sexually transmitted diseases, and just recently, a "new" infection has been revealed, called the mycoplasma genitalium, or MG.
According to CNN, the infection has been discovered way back in the 80s, but at the time it wasn't considered as an STD. Researchers from the University College of London revealed recently that the bacterial infection, which can be found in the urinary and genital tracks, could possibly be contracted through sexual contact, and another finding is that MG is most often than not asymptomatic.
Many other STDs are asymptomatic, meaning there are usually no signs or symptoms of being infected, which makes it more difficult to track.
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The study included 4,507 men and women aged 18 to 44 and were sexually active "with at least one partner" and it was discovered that 48 of the women and 24 of the men had MG. To further prove their theory, the researchers extracted urine samples from about 200 teenagers who "never had sex" and it turns out none of them came out positive with MG.
Raquel Dardik, MD, clinical associate professor at NYU Langone's Joan H. Tisch Center for Women's Health, says there are some signs and symptoms that people should be careful of and these include irritation, painful urination, and bleeding after contact — for women — while men could experience painful urination or a watery discharge.
Dardik also explains that MG is also a common starting point for developing PID or pelvic inflammatory disease, which causes a painful cervix, fever, abdominal pain, and pain or bleeding during contact.
Despite the emerging of a new form of STD, Dardik believes that with the new findings, more labs will start offering tests for the infection. This goes with the confirmation that people who experience the mentioned symptoms can ask their doctors to test them.
If a person thinks he or she may be experiencing the symptoms but all tests show a negative status, "it's important to consider that MG may be the cause," she says.
