Prevalence of syphilis in general and high risk population in Tirunelveli

Syphilis, a sexually transmitted disease which seemed to have disappeared or had been controlled over the years has now been re-emerged as a major public health problem. The World Health Organization estimated approximately 12 million new cases of syphilis in adults worldwide.1 The World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines f o r t h e s e r o l o g i c a l d i a g n o s i s o f s y p h i l i s recommends the use of rapid plasma reagin test and Treponema pallidum haemagglutination assay as standard tests for screening and diagnostic purposes.2The baseline information studies on STI prevalence in Tirunelveli which are necessary to formulate control strategies are lacking .Therefore the present study was carried out to d e t e r m i n e t h e p r e v a l e n c e o f s y p h i l i s i n Tirunelveli. MATERIALS AND METHODSA total of 100 sera were obtained from general population , another 100 sera from high risk population were subjected to RPR, TPHA. RESULTS Out of 100 individuals in general population, one was reactive by RPR and none was positive by TPHA. Out of 100 individuals in high risk population three were reactive for RPR and among them one was positive by TPHA. CONCLUSION In this study the prevalence of syphilis in general population in Tirunelveli was found to be nil. The prevalence of syphilis in high risk population was 1 in Tirunelveli. It is concluded that the prevalence of syphilis is reduced and it may be due to the increased awareness among the people due to high literacy rate and easy availability of drugs.