U.S. researchers recommend antibiotics be given to the partners of people with sexually transmitted diseases without having to see a doctor first.
The controversial recommendation was part of an editorial by John Hopkins University researchers in Wednesday's New England Journal of Medicine backing a study that shows the U.S. rate of STD infections, 117 per 100,000 people, is six times the goal rate of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
The study of 1,800 women and heterosexual men at the University of Washington Seattle found faster antibiotic treatment of the partners of people diagnosed with STDs reduced re-infections for gonorrhea by 68 percent and Chlamydia by 18 percent.
Traditional approaches to treating partners are not fast or effective enough, researchers said. They recommended antibiotics be given to partners of STD carriers without first seeing a doctor, something now allowed in just two states -- California and Tennessee.
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