Googling for health care costs recently, I came across this April 2009 media release by the Centers for Disease Control:

“With an estimated 19 million new sexually transmitted infections occurring every year in the United States, it is clear that sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) remain a widespread and persistent health threat in this country. The health consequences of STDs can be staggering…”
[snip]
“The economic impact of STDs is also substantial, with an estimated cost of $15.9 billion annually to the U.S. health care system.”
[snip]
“Almost half of the new STD infections that occur each year are among young people 15 – 24 years of age; both rates and consequences of Chlamydia and gonorrhea are far more severe among women than men…”

A lot of women pay the cost of their own STD treatment, which started me thinking about what we women could buy with nearly 16 billion dollars … 159 million pairs of $100 shoes … 16 million 7-day cruises around the Caribbean … 500,000 shiny new $30,000 cars.

STDs, their consequences and costs are preventable. And who couldn’t use a few more pairs of shoes?

Tags: cost, regret

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 19th, 2009 at 8:06 am and is filed under STDs, Sexuality. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.