Chlamydia STD rife among Japanese teens

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More than 10 percent of Japanese teenagers who were screened for the sexually transmitted disease chlamydia tested positive, a newspaper reported, adding to concerns about increasing sexual activity among Japan’s youth.

An average of 11.4 percent of high school students on the main northern island of Hokkaido tested positive for chlamydia infection, which often displays no symptoms but can cause infertility, the Yomiuri Shimbun daily reported Thursday.

The screening, led by Hirohisa Imai, a doctor at Asahikawa Medical University, targeted 3,190 male and female students at 13 high schools in Hokkaido, whose patterns of teen sexual activity mirror those of the nation as a whole, the Yomiuri said.

Chlamydia can cause ectopic pregnancy and infertility in women, and urethritis and testicular swelling in men.

Some 20 to 30 percent of Japanese 16-year-olds have had sex, and nearly a quarter of these have had four or more partners, according to Masako Kihara, an AIDS expert and associate professor at Kyoto University.

Kihara said she was unaware of the survey but that the figure of 10 percent did not particularly surprise her, given that chlamydia is the most prevalent sexual disease among teenagers.

“If it really is spreading this fast, it shows that there’s a lot of unprotected sex going on, and that other sexual diseases could also be spread,” she said.

Of particular concern to authorities is AIDS.

In 2003, 976 new HIV/AIDS cases were reported, the highest annual figure and about a tenth of all new cases since 1985. Of new HIV cases, at least 33 percent involved people under 29.

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