Rise in STIs in over-50s sparks calls for safe sex

Published on Friday 3 February 2012 00:00

THE number of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among older people has doubled in ten years, prompting calls for the middle-aged and elderly to practise safer sex.

Scientists have found a dramatic rise among 50 to 90-year-olds in cases of syphilis, chlamydia, gonorrhoea and genital herpes.

The study, published in The Student BMJ, concluded that older, post-menopausal women were more vulnerable to STIs due to physical changes, while men on erectile dysfunction drugs were significantly more likely to be diagnosed with an infection within the first year of usage and in the year before starting the drug.

Researchers Rachel von Simson, a medical student at King’s College London, and Dr Ranjababu Kulasegaram, a consultant genitourinary physician at St Thomas’ Hospital, in London, say 80 per cent of this age group were sexually active.

A breakdown of the figures reveal an increase in cases of syphilis, chlamydia and gonorrhoea in the UK, US and Canada in 45 to 64-year-olds.

There has also been an increase in cases of HIV, with those aged 50 and over accounting for 20 per cent of adults accessing HIV care, an 82 per cent increase on figures from 2001. The researchers suggested that this increase might be down to HIV patients living longer.