A new antibiotic has proven as effective as the last remaining recommended treatment for gonorrhea, helping to assuage mounting fears among public health experts about the emergence of drug-resistant strains of the sexually transmitted infection.
Gonorrhea is the second most common STI in the U.S. and has developed resistance to all antibiotics used to treat it, except for the recommended combined therapy of an injection of the antibiotic ceftriaxone with one dose of azithromycin pills. In recent years, ominous reports have suggested that this antibiotic arsenal might not maintain its robust effectiveness against the fast-evolving pathogen for much longer.
On Wednesday, results from a late-stage clinical trial of a new antibiotic called zoliflodacin showed the drug cured so-called uncomplicated gonorrhea infections as effectively as ceftriaxone and azithromycin. The drug was developed by the Global Antibiotic Research & Development Partnership, a Swiss nonprofit, and the U.S.-based Innoviva Specialty Therapeutics.
“Zoliflodacin gives us a new tool in the treatment of gonorrhea, and if used wisely, a barrier against the further spread of resistant infections,” said Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, an infectious disease expert at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, who was not involved in the trial.
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The antibiotic, which would be the first new gonorrhea treatment approved in decades, could make it to market by 2025. The World Health Organization estimates that globally there are more than 82 million new gonorrhea cases every year. In the U.S., in the wake of decades of cuts to state and local public health departments, STIs have soared to record heights.
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