Common Bacterial vagina infection is actually a sexually transmitted disease that can be helped by the treatment of male sexual partners, have discovered researchers.
Bacterial vaginosis affects almost a third of women around the world and can cause infertility, premature births and newborns. It has long been attributed to an imbalance in the distribution of healthy organizations living in the vagina, researchers said in a report in The New England Journal of Medicine.
More than 50% of women have recurrent bacterial vaginosis within three months of the usual treatment with oral antibiotics.
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In a test, 164 women with recurrent infections that were in monogamous relationships all received recommended antibiotics. Their male partners received either an oral antibiotic and a topical antibiotic cream, or a placebo.
The researchers stopped the test early when it became clear that the recurrence rate was 50% lower in the partners’ treatment group.
They say that their results have the key to reducing high recurrence rates for bacterial vaginosis.
“This successful intervention is relatively inexpensive and short and has the potential for the first time not only to improve the remedy against bacterial vaginosis for women”, but also to prevent serious associated infections and complications, said the Catriona Bradshaw study manager of Monash University in Australia in a statement.