United Democratic Alliance (UDA) politician Mike Sonko has caused a stir on the internet after alleging that one current sitting governor is infected with gonorrhea.
Taking to his Twitter account on Thursday night, Sonko went ahead to tell Kenyans that he would avail more details.
"Kuna a male sitting governor ako na gonorrhea. Details loading..." Sonko wrote on his Twitter account.
While the post has caused a lot of chatter online, some of his followers flipped the revelation against Sonko using an inaccurate Google translation of the Swahili statement.
Ministry of Health clarifies KEMRI study that found Super Gonorrhea
On January 12, 2022, researchers from the Kenya Medical Research Institute(KEMRI) announced that a new strain of gonorrhea, Super Gonorrhea, which is resistant to standard antibiotics, was circulating in Nairobi.
KEMRI arrived at the conclusion after conducting a survey that included more than 350 sex workers in Nairobi. Researchers found that at least three-quarters of the participants have unprotected sex with their customers because it pays more.
Some of them admitted that they had served up to 29 men in two weeks.
However, the ministry of health brought a ray of hope to Nairobians and Kenya as a whole, after stating that only one case was found in the samples they had collected.
"This report came from a study that was conducted by KEMRI among escorts and out of the pathogens they looked at was Neisseria gonorrhea, the organism that causes gonorrhea.
"Out of that, there were quite a number of pathogens that were resistant to ordinary antibiotics, and in one particular individual, out of a sample of 400, was one that was resistant to nearly all the antibiotics we put it through," said MoH official Dr Patrick Amoth.
What is Super Gonorrhea?
Super gonorrhea, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), is an extensively drug-resistant strain of the sexually transmitted infection, gonorrhea. It cannot be easily treated using the currently recommended prescriptions.
Why Super Gonorrhea is drug-resistant?
Gonorrhea is the world's second most common STD after chlamydia according to WHO. The commonly used drugs for treatment are antibiotics such as Ceftriaxone and Azithromycin.
The new strain does not react to these drugs for a range of reasons including; overused or poor-quality antibiotics, inherent genetic mutations, and comorbidities such as other genital infections.
Effects of Super Gonorrhea
If left untreated, super gonorrhea can directly affect your health negatively. It increases the chances of spreading the disease and acquiring other STIs.
It can also lead to infertility, eye infections that may cause blindness, ectopic pregnancies and maternal deaths.