And today's lesson: if you're going to travel abroad, remember to keep it zipped. Or at least use a condom or 20.
Holidays can be bad for your health, according to research suggesting that those who seek sex in the sun should be screened for infectious diseases when they return. More than 30 million UK residents - about half the population - travel abroad each year, said a paper in the British Medical Journal. Karen Rogstad, a consultant in the department of genito-urinary medicine at the Royal Hallamshire hospital in Sheffield, has found an "alarming increase" in the number of sexually transmitted infections. Foreign travel appears to be responsible for a small but significant proportion, including 21% of syphilis cases in men.
Nine per cent of people with gonorrhoea reported having sex abroad in the previous three months. Bisexual or gay men mostly had sex in the US and Europe, while hetero-sexual men had sex in the Caribbean or Far East. Women mainly reported new sexual encounters in the Caribbean, the paper said. Many new cases of HIV infection in the UK were the result of encounters abroad - a quarter of the UK-born women infected between 2000 and 2002, and 69% of men, of whom probably 22% were infected in Thailand.
The women were infected in Thailand? Oh. Well. Um. My. Whoda thunk?
To be sure, these are British statistics. But there's no reason to assume that the risk is any lower for Americans traveling abroad. (Especially since we seem to be having sex with Britons when they come here. It would be fascinating to see what the statistics were for people having sex with foreigners who come to visit. Those stats probably couldn't be properly determined, however.)
Posted by iain at July 24, 2004 02:38 AM
