The number of cases of babies born with syphilis in Canada has increased by 1,271 per cent from 2017 to 2021, with the disease possibly leading to devastating complications, including stillbirths.
According to figures from the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), just seven cases of children born with syphilis were recorded in 2017 but the number has surged to 96 cases in 2021.
“It can lead to outcomes such as fetal demise … or stillbirth,” Dr Darrell Tan, an infectious disease physician at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto told broadcaster CBC.
“And then in a child [born with syphilis] there can be many, many manifestations … it can affect organ systems like the brain, the bones and joints, virtually any organ system in the body,” he added.
Theories for the rapid rise vary from low use of condoms in Canada to better testing catching more cases. “When you have cases, case rates that are going up to this degree, you start to see it spread beyond just the core sexual networks that had traditionally been involved,” Dr Tan said.
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According to CBC, syphilis has primarily been observed among men who have sexual relations with other men in the past but the demographics of those with the disease appear to be shifting.
“The most confusing and frustrating thing is that it can cause no symptoms at all, and people can contract it without even realizing it,” Dr Tan said. Syphilis can lead to serious illness if left untreated, including organ damage, eyesight loss and even death but can be treated by antibiotics if caught early.
Syphilis has seen a surge in other countries across the globe, with a 2016 report noting that the disease had become more common among 15 to 24-year-olds, blaming hookup apps like Tinder for the increase in anonymous casual sex encounters.
In 2019, a report from the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), noted that cases of syphilis among 30 different countries had surged between 2007 and 2017 and that cases of the sexually transmitted disease outnumbered new cases of HIV.
“The growth in the number of syphilis infections we see in Europe and other countries around the world is the result of several factors such as sex without a condom and with multiple sexual partners, combined with less fear of getting HIV,” Head of the ECDC program for HIV and venereal diseases Andrew Amato-Gauci said.
Follow Chris Tomlinson on Twitter at @TomlinsonCJ or email at ctomlinson(at)breitbart.com.