By Angela Hill

Syphilis report has meaning for Saskatchewan

Jan 10, 2011 | 6:24 AM

Health officials in Prince Albert are closely looking at a report on the outbreak of syphilis in Alberta.

“This does affect us, it does affect us. We have a lot of ties with Albert and what happens in Albert does affect us here,” said Dr. Khami Chokani, medical health officer for the Prince Albert Parkland Health Region.

The way syphilis is increasing and who it is affecting is similar between central Saskatchewan and the north of Alberta.

“Our totally number of cases are much lower, so we can’t do the analysis they have done, but the overall pattern is very similar,” said Dr. Dr. Saqib Shahab, deputy chief medical health officer for the provincial Ministry of Health.

The women being infected tend to be younger, while the men are older, Shahab said.

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This is particularly concerning because women of childbearing age are at risk of passing syphilis on to their children — a potentially fatal disease, said Shahab.

Alberta has a number of cases of congenital syphilis under investigation or confirmed, something not yet seen in Saskatchewan.

“We have not seen any congenital syphilis so far, we are investigating a stillbirth that happened … that could have been complicated by syphilis, but again it’s not classically classified as congenital syphilis,” Shahab said.

To be a classic case of congenital syphilis, the baby must be a life birth.

“That we have not seen, but certainly there have been a few women that did have syphilis or were contacts of cases with syphilis and they delivered and the infant was monitored very closely,” he said.

Shahab said a lot of credit needs to go to the Prince Albert Parkland Health Region for their work in tracing the contacts of people with syphilis and giving them treatment.

“What we have been doing here in Prince Albert is we are trying to stop the horse before it leaves the barn. We are trying to be proactive, to catch this very treatable, very preventable disease from becoming an epidemic,” said Chokani.

This has meant only 23, laboratory confirmed cases province-wide.

“If you treat someone early, you might get tested and the test will be negative. So the confirmed cases, I’m saying 23 in 2010, they are actually an underestimate of the total number of cases — that were prevented by timely treatment and I think that’s where you really want to be,” said Shabab.

The number of suspected cases that have been tracked and treated is actually three to four times higher. This is part of an increasing number of cases of syphilis seen in Saskatchewan — previous to 2005 there were almost no cases in the province.

Late in 2010, the province of New Brunswick declared an outbreak of infectious syphilis.

For more information:
The Syphilis Outbreak in Alberta

Syphilis outbreak in Alberta widespread: report

ahill@panow.com