Page 1065 - 1970S

January 1972 The PLAIN TRUTH 21
Oommon •isconceptions
lbout Venereal Disease
CONTRARY to popular myth, the
professional prostitute is re–
sponsible for only about 5 percent
of all VD infections. It is true that
in pre-penicillin days, the filie de
joie was a major spreader of the
disease, but that is not so today.
Now it is the promiscuous boy aod
girl or man and woman ( about 80
percent of the cases) and homo–
sexuals (at least 15 percent of the
cases) that have taken over the
wholesale propagation of infection.
Some have erroneously thought
they could get VD only from fe–
males. But in many areas 20 percent
or more of the infections are trans–
mitted by homosexual practices. And
since ma.le homosexuals usually make
more contacts tban those involved in
heterosexual promiscuous sex, the
problem is exploding among them.
Hush-hush attitudes and half–
truths about VD have engendered
many popular aod daogerous myths.
A boy passed his father's chair
and, noticing an article on VD,
asked, "What's that, Dad?"
The father hastily folded up the
paper and said, "Nothing, son."
Later, he told him, "You don't have
to worry as long as you go with
clean gi rls."
But syphilis and gonorrhea trans–
mission have nothing to do with
dirt, "clean" appearance or "good"
breeding. A shower twice a day
means nothing.
Neither does poverty, per se. VD's
association with slums or poverty
areas is true to a large extent, but
only because these areas concentrate
the worst factors that encourage the
transmission of the disease - igno–
rance, careless morality, lack of treat-
be infecting numerous others through
carelessness and ignorance.
Vast Reservoir of Infection
In the United States, VD's number
ooe epidemic position has prompted
calls for "natiooal emergency action."
After two decades of decline, reported
cases of VD have dottbled in the last
five years and threaten to double again
by 1975.
Over two million cases were treated
meot or lack of educatioo to detect
the disease. VD is prevalent in all
classes when conditions are met. No
race is immune.
Myths About · Transmission
It is next to impossible for it to be
transmitted by public toilets, dirty
door knobs, drinking cups, eating
utensils, water, food or air. Even the
possibi lity of transmission by hand–
shaking is remote.
A knowledge of the· nature of the
syphilis and gooorrbea organisms
shows why. The organisms are frag–
ile outside the human body. Re–
moved from human tissues, they die
within .reconds ( or a few minutes at
most) upoo contact with Iight, heat,
dryness or air. They thrive only at
body temperature and cannot sur–
vive great fluctuations of tempera–
ture. (Once inside the human body,
however, they are anything but fra–
gile aod delicate. They are one of
the hardest organisms for the body to
destroy.)
Venereal disease is not self-engen–
dered. It is spread to others by coo–
tact with people who have the
disease. Syphilis and gonorrhea
microbes grow, in nature, only in
humaos. They do not naturally iofect
other animals and are not known to
be spread by them. Overwhelmingly
and almost exclusively, they are
spread from person to person by sex–
ual intercourse or intimate body
contact.
lo a gonorrhea infection, no prac–
tica! immunity develops. In syphilis,
although there may be a certain, but
imperfect, leve! of immunity after
years of infection, it can be over–
whelmed by a large reinfection. If
in the United States in 1970, according
to official estimates. Only a fraction of
that number were actually reported.
Many more were infected but not
treated. Sorne cities reported a 50 per–
cent increase in syphilis, although
nationally, it averaged out to an 8 per–
cent increase.
No one really knows the extent of
the reservoir of infection in the United
States, but it is alarmingly vast by any
measure. Over 14 million Americans
cured by early treatment (before any
degree of immunity can be devel–
oped) an individual can be imme–
diately reinfected again and again -
and many are. Syphilis aod gon–
orrhea can infect the same person at
the same time.
No immuoizing vaccine for either
exists. (Gonococci characteristics
make it an unlikely vaccioe candi–
date. The fragile nature of the syphi–
lis organism outside the human body
has not permitted it to be cultured
for such a use.)
VD is not passed through heredity
(by genes), but syphilis can be
passed congeoitally - that is, to an
already developing fetus through the
placenta of an infected mother.
Syphilis thus contracted without de–
tection can be tragic. In many cases,
syphilis germs kill the fetus, causing
a miscarriage, abortion or stillbirth,
or the disease can cause disfiguring
birth defects among live babies.
The Pill, of course, does not pre–
vent VD infection. In fact, it ap–
pareotly adds an extra susceptibility
factor.
According to Dr. Walter Smartt of
the Los Angeles County Health De–
partment, women on the Pill seem
more liable to VD infections and
complications.
As for prophylactics, investigators
find many don't use them, or if they
plan to, take risks. No chemical or
medica! preventive device offers ab–
.ro/11/e protection from infection.
Even the use of male condoms is not
a 100 percent guarantee against
syphilis infection, and depending on
how it is used, it may be no
protection for gonorrhea either.
carry either syphilis or gonorrhea, or
both, the most common forms of vene–
real disease. Alarming percentages of
victims do not manifest outward signs
of infectioo.
In many areas, ~specially within large
urban complexes, one out of ten teen–
agers and youog adults is suspected of
carcying a venereal disease.
Statistically, every 16 seconds another
American is infected with VD, every
other one a youth under 2 5. In the Los