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Charles Ebel, Senior Director, Program Development, American Social Health Association (ASHA), P.O. Box 13827, Research Triangle Park, NC 27709, 919-361-8458, chaebe@ashastd.org
Although genital herpes (GH) is the sexually transmitted infection with the highest prevalence in the United States today, up until now GH treatment and prevention has been a relatively low-priority problem for public health officials. Historically, barriers to action have included a public health focus on bacterial STDs, the high proportion of asymptomatic or 'unrecognized' GH carriers, inadequacies and cost of the conventional diagnostic assays, the cost of antiviral drugs, and the lack of an efficacious primary or secondary prevention strategy.
Recent advances in the area of laboratory diagnostics, treatment and prevention research, however, give reason to reconsider the potential for greater efforts to promote GH prevention. In this session, experts in the GH field will profile a number of key issues, among them: epidemiologic trends, GH as a facilitator of HIV transmission, the availability of new diagnostic tools and models for case identification, the role of antiviral drugs in preventing transmission, and vaccine development. Special attention will be paid to 1) the potential for increased use of serologic tests for HSV among sexually active adults and 2) the issue of herpes in newborns, including frequency of neonatal herpes, risk factors, changes in the management of herpes in pregnancy, and potential improvement in surveillance for neonatal herpes infections.
Learning Objectives:
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.