Researchers studying a mass vaccination campaign against meningitis have found a surprising side-effect — the shots also offered moderate protection against gonorrhea.

The study, published in The Lancet medical journal, mark the first time immunization has shown any protection against gonorrhea, and points to new avenues in the search for a gonorrhea vaccine, scientists said.

"This new research could be game-changing," said Linda Glennie, an expert at the Meningitis Research Foundation who was not directly involved in the study.

Gonorrhea has become an increasingly urgent global health problem in recent years as strains of the bacterial infection have developed high levels of drug resistance.

The World Health Organization warned last week that some totally drug-resistance superbug strains of the disease already pose a major threat.

In the study, published in the journal PLoS Medicine, the WHO calls the increase in drug-resistant gonorrhea a "serious situation." The organization said a vaccine "will ultimately be the only sustainable way to achieve control."

No gonorrhea vaccine

Yet so far, efforts to develop a gonorrhea vaccine have yielded disappointing results. Four potential shots have reached the clinical trial stage, but none has been effective, The Lancet said in a press release.

In New Zealand, around one million people under age 20 received a meningitis vaccine known as MeNZB during a 2004-06 immunization program. This provided a valuable opportunity to test for cross-protection, the scientists explained.

Drug-resistant gonorrhea culture are shown under a microscope lens. (Canadian Press)

For their study, the team used data from 11 sexual health clinics for all people aged 15 to 30 who had been diagnosed with gonorrhea or chlamydia, or both, and who had also been eligible to be immunized against meningitis in the 2004-06 campaign.

They found that those who had been vaccinated were significantly less likely to have gonorrhea. And taking into account factors such as ethnicity, deprivation, geographical area and gender, having the MeNZB vaccine reduced the incidence of gonorrhea by around 31 per cent.

A health awareness poster from 1943 warns of the risk from syphilis and gonorrhea. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Those who had been vaccinated and contracted gonorrhea were less likely to have a more severe form of the disease, compared with people who weren't vaccinated.

Helen Petousis-Harris, who co-led the study at the University of Auckland, said the findings "provide experimental evidence and a proof of principle" that meningitis vaccines might offer moderate cross-protection against gonorrhea.

"Our findings could inform future vaccine development for both the meningococcal and gonorrhea vaccines," she said.

Although the diseases have very different symptoms and transmission modes, she said, the bacteria Neisseria gonorrheae and Neisseria meningitidis have an up to 90 per cent genetic match, providing a biologically plausible mechanism.</s>MONDAY, July 10, 2017 (HealthDay News) -- A vaccine to protect people from the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea may be one step closer to reality, New Zealand researchers report.

That's welcome news, because gonorrhea appears to be eluding treatment efforts to control the disease. Antibiotics are the only available treatment, but strains of antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea have developed, according to U.S. health officials.

"Despite efforts, a gonorrhea vaccine with any clinical effect has eluded development for over 100 years," said lead researcher Helen Petousis-Harris, a senior lecturer at the University of Auckland.

"We have found a vaccine that prevented about one-third of gonorrhea in those who received it in a real-life situation. It is far from perfect, but it is a leap in the right direction," she said.

Called MeNZB vaccine, it was developed to control a meningitis epidemic in New Zealand from 2004 to 2006 and is no longer available. But the antigens in the vaccine thought to provide the immune response to gonorrhea are included in the more recently developed 4CMenB vaccine, which is available in many countries, Petousis-Harris said.

The researchers found that people who had been vaccinated with the MeNZB vaccine were less likely to have gonorrhea than those who weren't (41 percent versus 51 percent).

"We followed up the observation that gonorrhea rates appeared to drop in association with the use of this type of meningococcal B vaccine and found that indeed the vaccine had a protective effect against gonorrhea for a period of time after its use. About one-third of those vaccinated were protected," Petousis-Harris said.

After taking into account factors such as race, sex, socioeconomics and geographical area, the researchers calculated that vaccination reduced the odds of getting gonorrhea by 31 percent.

In the United States, teens and preteens, as well as some children and adults, are advised to get one of two meningococcal vaccines to protect against meningitis. Whether the current meningococcal vaccines would protect against gonorrhea still needs to be tested.

It's also not clear how long the immune response might last, Petousis-Harris said.</s>A vaccine to protect people from the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea may be one step closer to reality, New Zealand researchers report.

That's welcome news, because gonorrhea appears to be eluding treatment efforts to control the disease. Antibiotics are the only available treatment, but strains of antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea have developed, according to U.S. health officials.

"Despite efforts, a gonorrhea vaccine with any clinical effect has eluded development for over 100 years," said lead researcher Helen Petousis-Harris, a senior lecturer at the University of Auckland.

"We have found a vaccine that prevented about one-third of gonorrhea in those who received it in a real-life situation. It is far from perfect, but it is a leap in the right direction," she said.

Called MeNZB vaccine, it was developed to control a meningitis epidemic in New Zealand from 2004 to 2006 and is no longer available. But the antigens in the vaccine thought to provide the immune response to gonorrhea are included in the more recently developed 4CMenB vaccine, which is available in many countries, Petousis-Harris said.

The researchers found that people who had been vaccinated with the MeNZB vaccine were less likely to have gonorrhea than those who weren't (41 percent versus 51 percent).

"We followed up the observation that gonorrhea rates appeared to drop in association with the use of this type of meningococcal B vaccine and found that indeed the vaccine had a protective effect against gonorrhea for a period of time after its use. About one-third of those vaccinated were protected," Petousis-Harris said.

After taking into account factors such as race, sex, socioeconomics and geographical area, the researchers calculated that vaccination reduced the odds of getting gonorrhea by 31 percent.

In the United States, teens and preteens, as well as some children and adults, are advised to get one of two meningococcal vaccines to protect against meningitis. Whether the current meningococcal vaccines would protect against gonorrhea still needs to be tested.

It's also not clear how long the immune response might last, Petousis-Harris said.

"Modeling has suggested that even a vaccine with quite a modest level of effectiveness could have a significant impact on gonorrhea over the period of fifteen years or so," she said.

Dr. Mitchell Kramer is chairman of the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Huntington Hospital in Huntington, N.Y.

"If gonorrhea goes untreated or is treated late, it can have a long-term health impact," he explained.

Untreated, it can lead to complications such as pelvic inflammatory disease, ectopic pregnancy and infertility, and it can make the transmission of HIV more likely, he said.

Kramer said that if a vaccine against multiple strains of gonorrhea could be developed, it would be very beneficial.

Approximately 78 million new cases of gonorrhea are seen worldwide each year, the study showed.

Given the concerning situation with multi-drug resistant gonorrhea, a vaccine might play a critical role, Petousis-Harris said.

"At the moment, there seems nowhere else to go with untreatable gonorrhea," she said. "This finding can inform further research on gonorrhea vaccine development; it provides a pointer in what may be the right direction."

For the study, Petousis-Harris and colleagues reviewed information on about 1 million people who received the MeNZB vaccine in a mass immunization program.

The researchers collected data on people aged 15 to 30 who had been diagnosed with gonorrhea or chlamydia, or both. All were eligible to get the MeNZB vaccine. The data came from 11 clinics in New Zealand.

Nearly 15,000 people were included in the analysis. More than 1,200 who had gonorrhea, more than 12,400 with chlamydia and 1,000 who had both.

The report was published July 10 in The Lancet journal.

Dr. H. Hunter Handsfield is a spokesman for the Sexual Health Association and a professor emeritus of medicine at the University of Washington Center for AIDS and STD.

"This paper is intriguing as a concept, but not as a reason to use this vaccine to protect people from gonorrhea," he said.

Developing a vaccine for gonorrhea has been elusive, he said.

With diseases such as chickenpox or measles or mumps and others, once you have had the infection, you are naturally immune to getting it again, which is why vaccines are successful in preventing disease, he explained.

With gonorrhea, however, getting the infection doesn't confer immunity to getting it again. That makes developing a vaccine problematic, Handsfield said.

Handsfield doesn't think the results of this study were strong enough to start vaccinating people in hopes of reducing the chances of getting gonorrhea.

"This vaccine should not be used to control gonorrhea," he said. "I don't think the conclusions are solid enough to be confident that that would help. I wouldn't advise widespread use for the purpose of gonorrhea prevention."</s>Evidence from a mass vaccination campaign for an outbreak of bacterial meningitis in New Zealand had unexpected results: reduced rates of the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea, a study published Monday in the journal The Lancet finds. It is the first time a vaccine has shown any protection against gonorrhea.

Scientists say the results provide fresh inspiration for developing a specific vaccine against the STD, which causes about 78 million new cases worldwide each year.

In recent years, gonorrhea has shown increasing antibiotic resistance, with some patients unable to be treated with any available drug. Because of this, the World Health Organization includes gonorrhea in its list of bacteria that pose the greatest threat to human health.

“The emergence of completely drug-resistant gonorrhoea is a major concern,” Dr. Helen Petousis-Harris, lead author of the new study and a senior lecturer at the University of Auckland, wrote in an email.

She explained that “even moderate protection” against the sexually transmitted disease could have significant impact because the bacteria that cause it “are very tricky.” They develop resistance to drugs by transferring genes in atypical ways and recombining with related bacterial species.

“Given the emergence of drug resistance, a vaccine may be our only avenue,” Petousis-Harris said.

“In the early 2000s, there was a large epidemic of meningococcal B disease in NZ. The disease rate was very high, and it was affecting a lot of people,” said study co-author Dr. Steve Black of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. In the absence of a vaccine, the government requested help from the WHO to “tailor-make” one.

Meningococcal disease, the bacterial form of meningitis, is a serious infection of the meninges, the membrane covering the brain. It’s transmitted from person to person, usually in close contact, such as kissing, sneezing or coughing, or living in close quarters with an infected person.

“Meningococcal B disease is very lethal disease, and even people who survive are left with a lot of lifelong medical problems,” Black explained.

A vaccine targeting the specific strain of bacteria causing meningococcal disease in the New Zealand outbreak was eventually “developed in a collaboration between Chiron Vaccines, the National Institute of Public Health of Norway (NIPH) and the New Zealand government,” according to Mary Anne Rhyne, director of corporate communications at GlaxoSmithKline, the pharmaceutical company that inherited the vaccine from Chiron through a series of corporate acquisitions.

The vaccine targeted the vesicle, or sac, on the outer membrane of the bacteria.

Beginning in 2004 and lasting through 2006, a mass vaccination campaign inoculated most of the New Zealand population: about 90%, including 81% of those under age 20. New Zealand scientists then published their results for the impact of the vaccine on the outbreak.

“I wondered, in looking at their results from the outbreak, if there was any possibility that this vaccine might have had any other effects,” said Black, who focused on the country’s gonorrhea statistics in particular.

Neisseria gonorrhoeae bacteria (which cause gonorrhea) and Neisseria meningitidis bacteria (which cause meningococcal disease) are “two related organisms. They’re cousins, if you will,” he said, explaining that the genetic makeup of the two is “85 to 90% similar.”

Seeing how rates of gonorrhea fell after the vaccination campaign, Black knew that a scientific study of his theory needed to be done.

Petousis-Harris and her co-researchers, who had access to a database recording events during the meningococcal B outbreak, set to work testing his hypothesis.

“We compared the vaccination rates in two groups of people,” Petousis-Harris explained. One group had gonorrhea, and the other group had chlamydia, both of which are spread through sexual contact.

If the vaccine had an effect against gonorrhea because it is an organism related to meningococcal disease, the researchers hypothesized, then no effect should be seen against chlamydia, an unrelated organism.

“This is exactly what we saw,” Petousis-Harris wrote in an email. “We found that people with gonorrhoea were less likely to be vaccinated than people with chlamydia,” indicating that the vaccine protected against gonorrhea but not chlamydia.

The researchers also discovered that vaccinated people were significantly less likely to become infected with gonorrhea than people who had not received the vaccine: 41% vs. 51%.

Taking other factors into account, including ethnicity and gender, the researchers concluded that having received the meningococcal vaccine reduced the incidence of gonorrhea by about 31%.

Virginia Bowen, an epidemiologist in the Division of STD Prevention at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said that in 2015, there were more than 390,000 reported cases of gonorrhea in the United States. This is a 13% increase from the previous year.

“It is estimated that more than 800,000 new infections occur every year, but because gonorrhea can be symptomless, fewer than half of all new infections are diagnosed,” she said, explaining that untreated cases can cause serious problems, including conditions that lead to infertility in both men and women.

“For women, it can increase their risk for a life-threatening ectopic pregnancy,” Bowen said. “Untreated gonorrhea can also increase a person’s risk of acquiring or transmitting HIV.”

Gonorrhea is still treatable in the US, said Bowen, though resistance to the current antibiotics may develop.

Scientists with pharmaceutical companies are working to develop a vaccine specifically against the infection.

The New Zealand vaccine is no longer licensed, but the membrane-attacking component has been included in the formulation of Bexsero, GlaxoSmithKline’s meningococcal vaccine. Bexsero is made to offer broader coverage by fighting more strains than the original.

“These findings are encouraging,” Rhyne said. “The next step for GSK is to further explore and understand the potential of Bexsero to help protect against (gonorrhea).”

Petousis-Harris said the investigation also found the vaccine to be protective against gonorrhea hospitalizations.

Black said this suggests that the vaccine, which was effective against mild infections, may be more effective against the more severe cases.

Gonorrhea, noted Black, is in all countries. “This is really a universal issue,” he said. “It doesn’t kill, but it maims.”</s>LONDON: Researchers studying a mass vaccination campaign against meningitis have found a surprising side effect: the shots also offered moderate protection against gonorrhea, a sexually transmitted infection that is causing global alarm.

The findings, published in The Lancet medical journal on Tuesday, mark the first time an immunization has shown any protection against gonorrhea and point to new avenues in the search for a gonorrhea vaccine, scientists said.

"This new research could be game-changing," said Linda Glennie, an expert at the Meningitis Research Foundation who was not directly involved in the study.

Gonorrhea has become an increasingly urgent global health problem in recent years as strains of the bacterial infection have developed high levels of drug resistance.

The World Health Organization warned last week that some totally drug-resistance superbug strains of the disease already pose a major threat.

Yet so far, efforts to develop a gonorrhea vaccine have yielded disappointing results: Four potential shots have reached the clinical trial stage, but none has been effective.

In New Zealand, around 1 million people under age 20 received a meningitis vaccine known as MeNZB during a 2004-2006 immunization program. This provided a valuable opportunity to test for cross-protection, the scientists explained.

For their study, the team used data from 11 sexual health clinics for all people aged 15 to 30 who had been diagnosed with gonorrhea or chlamydia, or both, and who had also been eligible to be immunized against meningitis in the 2004-2006 campaign.

They found that those who had been vaccinated were significantly less likely to have gonorrhea. And taking into account factors such as ethnicity, deprivation, geographical area and gender, having the MeNZB vaccine reduced the incidence of gonorrhea by around 31 percent.

Helen Petousis-Harris, who co-led the study at the University of Auckland, said the findings "provide experimental evidence and a proof of principle" that meningitis vaccines might offer moderate cross-protection against gonorrhea.

"Our findings could inform future vaccine development for both the meningococcal and gonorrhea vaccines," she said.

Despite the diseases being very different in symptoms and transmission modes, she added, the bacteria Neisseria gonorrhoeae and Neisseria meningitidis have an up to 90 percent genetic match, providing a biologically plausible mechanism.</s>A mass vaccination campaign against meningitis in New Zealand had an unexpected side-effect — it helped protect people against gonorrhea, too.

The meningitis vaccine lowered the risk of gonorrhea by more than 30 percent, researchers reported in Tuesday’s issue of the Lancet.

It’s surprising news, even though the bacteria that cause gonorrhea and the bacteria that cause meningitis are related. That’s because infection with gonorrhea doesn’t make people immune to becoming infected again later. And most meningitis vaccines don’t seem to have infected gonorrhea rates at all.

And the findings show yet another benefit of vaccinating teenagers — who get recommended vaccines at a much lower rate than younger children do.

“To our knowledge, ours is the first study to show an association between a vaccine and a reduction in the risk of gonorrhea,” Dr. Helen Petousis-Harris of the University of Auckland in New Zealand and colleagues wrote in their report in the Lancet.

There had been some evidence that gonorrhea rates went down after use of a vaccine against one strain of meningitis, called meningitis B. This was a particularly tough strain to develop a vaccine against, and other meningitis vaccines don’t protect against meningitis B.

The vaccine was used in a mass campaign of a million people in 2004 to 2006. The researchers looked for visitors to sexually transmitted disease clinics to see if having been vaccinated made a difference.

They found 14,000 people for their study, including 1,200 people who had gonorrhea and more than 12,000 who had chlamydia, another STD. The meningitis vaccine wouldn’t be expected to protect against gonorrhea and it did not. But people who got the meningitis B vaccine were about 30 percent less likely to have gonorrhea than those who did not, the team reported.

“MeNZB was developed to control an epidemic and is no longer available,” the researchers said. But a new vaccine, called Bexsero, has a similar design and is available in the U.S. It's not clear if it offers any protection against gonorrhea, however.

“There is an 80-90 percent genetic match between the Neisseria gonorrhoeae and Neisseria meningitidis bacteria, providing a biologically plausible mechanism for cross-protection,” the team added.

Gonorrhea is very common — there are more than 820,000 cases of gonorrhea every year in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And the World Health Organization warned just last week that hard-to-treat, drug-resistant strains of gonorrhea are spreading globally.

Teens and pre-teens are advised to get vaccinated against meningitis in the U.S. There are two types of meningitis vaccines for preteens and teens: those that protect against the most common strains — A,C, W and Y — and group B vaccines. The CDC says all 11- to 12-year-olds should be vaccinated with a standard meningococcal conjugate vaccine, with a booster dose at 16. It says the meningitis B vaccine is optional.

Related: Meningitis B Vaccine Will be Imported to Fight Ivy League Outbreak

But only about a third of U.S. teens got both recommended doses of meningitis ACWY vaccine in 2015 and just 81 percent got at least one dose, which may not protect fully.

It found about a quarter of parents think vaccines are less important for teenagers than they are for younger kids.

The survey by the pro-vaccine Unity Consortium found that 57 percent of parents and teens have safety concerns about vaccines, even though many studies have shown how safe immunization is.

And just 44 percent of doctors have reminders for teenagers and their parents about vaccines, although that’s a common tactic for keeping younger children vaccinated on schedule.

The survey of 500 teens, 500 parents, 105 pharmacists and 400 physicians from September also found 23 percent of parents did not know which vaccines are recommended for their teenagers.

“There is a disconnect between teenagers' belief that their health is important and their actions,” said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

“They care about their health. And they trust their doctors and they believe that they should go to their doctors. And yet they don’t go. And many parents don’t think they need to,” Offit told NBC News.

The CDC recommends that teens and pre-teens get four vaccines:
• Tdap (tetanus, diphtheria, and pertussis or whooping cough) and a Td Booster
• HPV (human papillomavirus), which protects against the virus that causes cervical cancer, many cases of head and neck cancer and cancers of the penis and anus</s>A vaccine for gonorrhea has been developed in New Zealand that cut infections by about a third, according to the BBC.

About 78 million people are infected with gonorrhea each year and it is becoming resistant to antibiotics. No matter how many times someone is infected with the disease, the body doesn’t build up resistance to it.

The vaccine was developed about 10 years ago to fight meningitis B. Among those vaccinated, cases of gonorrhea dropped by 31 percent. The bacteria that cause meningitis B and gonorrhea are closely related.

Resistance to the drug that treats gonorrhea increased by 300 percent from 2013 to 2014, according to a study by the Centers for Disease Control.

In Dallas County, there were 4,968 cases of gonorrhea reported in the latest year statistics were available. Chlamydia is the most common sexually transmitted disease reported in Dallas.

The gonorrhea vaccine is not available yet in the U.S.</s>Scientists Stumble Upon Potential Vaccine For Gonorrhea At Best Possible Time

In an era where the sexually transmitted disease is becoming increasingly difficult to treat because of antibiotic resistance, researchers find that a vaccine for meningitis may also protect against gonorrhea. In other public health news: cervical cancer, sunscreen, double-booked surgeons, brain training, pigs' knees and more.

Stat: Vaccine Shows Protection Against Gonorrhea For First Time, Study Says 

 Finally, the world might be catching a break when it comes to drug-resistant gonorrhea. A new study suggests that a vaccine that protects against a strain of meningitis may also ward off the sexually transmitted infection. The research, conducted in New Zealand, found that the gonorrhea rate among teens and young adults there who had received a meningitis B vaccine during an emergency campaign in the early 2000s was significantly lower than the rate seen in people of the same age who weren’t vaccinated. (Branswell, 7/10)

Stat: Fewer Pap Screenings Mean More Cases Of Undiagnosed Chlamydia 

 When, a handful of years ago, the U.S. and Canada changed their screening guidelines for cervical cancer, it was an acknowledgment that screenings for young women carried unintended harms. However, a new study shows they also carried unintended benefits. As Pap screenings for women under 24 became less frequent in Ontario in 2012-2014, fewer cases of the bacterial infection chlamydia were caught — putting women at risk of potentially serious consequences. (Caruso, 7/10)

Stateline: Why More States Are Getting Serious About Sunscreen 

 Like ibuprofen or hay fever medication, sunscreen is considered an over-the-counter drug by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and therefore by almost all schools. That means kids can’t bring it to school without a doctor’s note, and even then must see the school nurse in order to use it. The result: Teachers leading a sunny field trip are free to cover themselves in a thick protective layer of sunscreen. But in most states, children can’t follow suit. In Indianapolis, for instance, kids go back to school July 31 — the height of summer — but they must have a doctor’s note to bring sunscreen to school, and visit the school nurse to put it on. (Moore, 7/11)

The Washington Post: Brain-Training Games Don’t Really Train Brains, A New Study Suggests 

 The first large study to rigorously examine brain-training games using cognitive tests and brain imaging adds to evidence that they are not particularly good at training brains and appear to have no more effect on healthy brains than video games. The study is another blow to companies such as Lumosity that have been accused of falsely claiming their programs can improve mental performance. (Gallegos, 7/10)

The Washington Post: New Drug Used On Mice Could Hold Potential For Traumatic Brain Injury. 

 For the first time, scientists have reversed memory and learning deficits in mice following traumatic brain injuries. This new research could someday lead to treatments for head trauma and debilitating cognitive diseases. More than 2 million Americans with traumatic brain injury (TBI) are seen in hospital emergency rooms every year. Millions more skip a hospital visit despite suffering a head injury that could cause lasting damage, according to researchers. (Gallegos, 7/10)

Stat: Turning To Pigs' Knees In The Quest To Delay Joint Replacements 

 Here in this hotspot for unregulated stem cell clinics, you don’t have to drive far to find a doctor offering unproven treatments for a bum knee involving stem cells derived from a patient’s own fat. In his lab here at the University of Southern California, Dr. Denis Evseenko wants to tackle knee problems with stem cells, too — but he’s a world away in his philosophy. He’s taking a stab at something much more ambitious. And he’s doing it by the book. (Robbins, 7/11)

Sacramento Bee: Trying To Eat Less Meat? You’re A Reducetarian 

 At the Reducetarian Foundation, Kateman and Alterman encourage people to eat less meat and remind people that vegans, vegetarians and reducetarians all share many of the same concerns about climate change, biodiversity loss, animal welfare and human health. It’s far easier, however, to imagine a meatless world once people have been successful at going without meat, Kateman said. (Anderson, 7/10)

Boston Globe: Study Eyes Sugary Beverage Intake During Pregancy 

 The children of mothers who consumed sugary drinks during their second trimester had a higher weight status than children of mothers who avoided the beverages, according to a study by Massachusetts researchers published Monday in the journal Pediatrics. For each additional serving per day, the child would weigh about half a pound more by age 8. (Feiner, 7/10)

Stat: This Doctor Helped Inspire A Controversial Netflix Movie About Anorexia 

 At age 78, Dr. Richard MacKenzie is having his Hollywood moment.He’s the physician who helped inspire a controversial Netflix movie about anorexia, “To the Bone,” which begins streaming on Friday. The film was written and directed by one of his former patients, Marti Noxon. She has credited MacKenzie with helping her overcome her struggles with anorexia and bulimia. (Robbins, 7/11)</s>A study published Monday in the journal The Lancet finds that evidence from a mass vaccination campaign for an outbreak of bacterial meningitis in New Zealand had unexpected results. The study finds reduced rates of the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea. It marks the first time a vaccine has shown any protection against gonorrhea. Scientists say the results provide fresh inspiration for developing a specific vaccine against the STD. It causes about 78 million new cases worldwide each year. In recent years, gonorrhea has shown increasing antibiotic resistance. Wochit</s>The New York Daily News is reporting that a new strain of ‘Super Gonorrhea’ is spreading around the world.

It is being mistreated as strep throat but in reality it’s a new strain of gonorrhea that is being spread through oral sex.

The bad part is that this new mutant gonorrhea can not be treated by any current means.

Left untreated gonorrhea can cause burning during urination, discharge, inflammation, and fertility problems for women.

USE CONDOMS to prevent this new mutant gonorrhea and all other STDs.

Read more about this from the NY Daily news here.
Researchers in New Zealand have discovered that the MeNZB vaccine for meningitis may protect against gonorrhea by 30%.