STD News

June 26, 2025

Top Headlines

HIV Is Surging in Over-50s—But Campaigns Still Target the Young

June 21, 2025 — HIV is surging among adults over 50 in sub-Saharan Africa, yet prevention and treatment campaigns still focus mainly on the young. New research reveals older adults face comparable or higher infection rates but remain largely invisible in HIV ...

Cold Sore Virus Hijacks Human Genome in 3D--and Scientists Found Its Weak Spot

June 20, 2025 — Cold sore-causing HSV-1 doesn't just hijack cells it reconfigures the entire architecture of our DNA to aid its invasion. Researchers discovered that it actively reshapes the 3D structure of the ...

One Shot to Stop HIV: MIT's Bold Vaccine Breakthrough

June 20, 2025 — Researchers from MIT and Scripps have unveiled a promising new HIV vaccine approach that generates a powerful immune response with just one dose. By combining two immune-boosting adjuvants alum and SMNP the vaccine lingers in lymph nodes for nearly ...

5-Minute STI Test Poised to Transform Sexual Health Diagnostics

June 9, 2025 — A revolutionary STI test developed by UK-based Linear Diagnostics is on track to dramatically reduce the time it takes to detect infections like gonorrhea and chlamydia. Built on ultra-fast EXPAR DNA amplification technology, the platform can ...

Preventing Chronic Inflammation from Turning Into Cancer

June 2, 2025 — Chronic inflammatory bowel disease is challenging to treat and carries a risk of complications, including the development of bowel cancer. Young people are particularly affected: when genetic predisposition and certain factors coincide, diseases ...

HIV Discovery Could Open Door to Long-Sought Cure

May 30, 2025 — New HIV research shows that small changes in the virus affect how quickly or slowly it replicates and how easily it can reawaken in the body. These insights bring researchers closer to finding ways to flush out the dormant virus and eliminate it for ...

HIV Vaccine Study Uncovers Powerful New Antibody Target

May 29, 2025 — In the long battle to create an effective HIV vaccine, scientists have made a major leap forward. A new study shows that a series of vaccines can coax the immune system to produce powerful antibodies capable of blocking a wide range of HIV strains ...

Researchers Engineer a Herpes Virus to Turn on T Cells for Immunotherapy

May 28, 2025 — A team identified herpes virus saimiri, which infects the T cells of squirrel monkeys, as a source of proteins that activate pathways in T cells that are needed to promote T cell ...

How Cholera Bacteria Outsmart Viruses

May 26, 2025 — Researchers uncover a notorious cholera strain that contains sophisticated immune systems to fend off viruses, which potentially helped it to fuel a devastating epidemic across Latin ...

New Blood Test Shows Superior Sensitivity in Detecting HPV-Associated Head and Neck Cancers

May 20, 2025 — Head and neck cancer researchers are reporting the development and testing of HPV-DeepSeek, a novel liquid biopsy assay. In their new study, HPV-DeepSeek achieved 99% sensitivty and specifity for ...

Could Nanoplastics in the Environment Turn E. Coli Into a Bigger Villain?

May 19, 2025 — Nanoplastics are everywhere. These fragments are so tiny they can accumulate on bacteria and be taken up by plant roots; they're in our food, our water, and our bodies. Scientists don't know the full extent of their impacts on our health, but new ...

Two HIV Vaccine Trials Show Proof of Concept for Pathway to Broadly Neutralizing Antibodies

May 16, 2025 — A decades-long scientific challenge in HIV vaccine development has been finding a way to train the immune system to produce antibodies that can target many variants of the virus. Traditional ...

Latest Headlines

updated 12:37pm EDT

'Loop'hole: HIV-1 Hijacks Human Immune Cells Using Circular RNAs

May 13, 2025 — Researchers have identified a never-before-seen mechanism that enables HIV-1 to evade the body's natural defenses and use it to support its survival and replication. The 'loophole' is a biological ...

Discovery Opens Up for New Ways to Treat Chlamydia

May 8, 2025 — Researchers have discovered a type of molecule that can kill chlamydia bacteria but spare bacteria that are important for health. The discovery opens the door for further research towards developing ...

New Molecular Label Could Lead to Simpler, Faster Tuberculosis Tests

May 5, 2025 — Chemists found a way to identify a complex sugar molecule in the cell walls of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the world's deadliest pathogen. This labeling could lead to simpler, faster TB ...

HIV: Genetic Characteristics Associated With Sustained HIV Remission After Stopping Treatment

May 3, 2025 — Tackling HIV continues to be a major public health challenge, mainly because the persistence of viral reservoirs means that people living with HIV ...

A Digestive 'Treasure Chest' Shows Promise for Targeted Drug Treatment in the Gut

May 2, 2025 — A new approach to drug design can deliver medicine directly to the gut in mice at significantly lower doses than current inflammatory bowel disease ...

Telehealth Might Be a Good Option for Women With Incontinence

Apr. 21, 2025 — Women who experience urinary incontinence after giving birth may get just as much relief from telehealth as they do from physical therapy, a new study has ...

An Antiviral Chewing Gum to Reduce Influenza and Herpes Simplex Virus Transmission

Apr. 4, 2025 — Low vaccination rates for influenza viruses and the lack of an HSV vaccine underscore the need for a new approach to reduce viral transmission. ...

Molecular Stool Test Could Improve Detection of Tuberculosis in Adults With HIV

Apr. 4, 2025 — The Xpert MTB/Ultra molecular diagnostic test for stool samples, until now recommended only for children, could be established as an additional test ...

Precision Medicine Could Be Possible in the Fight Against Antibiotic Resistance

Apr. 3, 2025 — Certain antibiotic-resistant infections could be treated with precision medicine in the future, thanks to a new resource mapping plasmids the ...

New Brain Organoid Model

Apr. 3, 2025 — Organoids have revolutionized science and medicine, providing platforms for disease modeling, drug testing, and understanding developmental processes. While not exact replicas of human organs, they ...

Novel Point-of-Care Technology Delivers Accurate HIV Results in Minutes

Apr. 2, 2025 — The technology described uses a nanomechanical platform and tiny cantilevers to detect multiple HIV antigens at high sensitivity in a matter of minutes. These silicon cantilevers are cheap and easy ...

New Antibiotic for Multidrug Resistant Superbug

Apr. 2, 2025 — Researchers discover a new class of antibiotic that selectively targets Neisseria gonorrhoeae, the bacterium that causes gonorrhoea. These substances trigger a self-destruction program, which also ...

Researchers Develop New DNA Test for Personalized Treatment of Bacterial Vaginosis

Mar. 28, 2025 — Roughly one out of three women ages 14-49 in the United States develop a vaginal bacterial imbalance known as bacterial vaginosis (BV) during their lifetime. BV is characterized by unpleasant odors, ...

Growing Body of Evidence Links HPV With Heart Disease

Mar. 25, 2025 — In addition to causing several types of cancer, human papillomavirus (HPV) appears to bring a significantly increased risk of heart disease and coronary artery disease, according to a new ...

New Data on Mpox Vaccine Effectiveness

Mar. 19, 2025 — A study has found that a single dose of the Imvanex vaccine provides protection against Mpox with 84% effectiveness. For people with HIV, however, a single dose of the vaccine fails to offer ...

Tunnel-Building Virus: How Zika Transmits from Mother to Fetus

Mar. 17, 2025 — The Zika virus builds tiny tunnels, called tunneling nanotubes, to stealthily transport material needed to infect nearby cells, including in placental cells, according to a team of researchers from ...

Researchers Develop Method to Identify Dormant Cells That Carry HIV

Mar. 13, 2025 — Study findings provide a new gene pathway for potential treatment of the virus affecting ...

Focus on the Gut-Liver Axis: Semisynthetic Bile Acid Has Anti-Inflammatory Effects on the Gut

Mar. 13, 2025 — A research team has made further progress in the treatment of intestinal inflammation. A study shows that the semi-synthetic bile acid NorUDCA inhibits in the intestine the formation of ...

Cause of Post-COVID Inflammatory Shock in Children Identified

Mar. 12, 2025 — MIS-C is a serious inflammatory shock that affects children. It can occur several weeks after a COVID infection and can be life-threatening. Until now, however, the precise cause of the condition was ...

Breakthrough in Next-Generation Polio Vaccines

Mar. 11, 2025 — A more affordable, lower-risk polio vaccine is on the horizon, research has ...

Intranasal Herpes Infection May Produce Neurobehavioral Symptoms

Mar. 10, 2025 — A study finds that herpes infection through the nose can lead to anxiety, motor impairment and cognitive issues. The research shows that by exploiting a cellular enzyme, the virus can produce ...

Injectable Therapy Is 'Magic' for Those Who Can't Take HIV Pills

Mar. 6, 2025 — Patients who struggle to take daily HIV pills can benefit from long-acting injectable treatments, a new study has ...

New STI Impacts 1 in 3 Women: Landmark Study Reveals Men Are the Missing Link

Mar. 5, 2025 — A landmark study reveals that bacterial vaginosis (BV), a condition affecting nearly a third of women worldwide and causing infertility, premature births and newborn deaths, is in fact an STI, paving ...

New Treatment Option for Psoriasis Discovered

Mar. 3, 2025 — Psoriasis is one of the most common chronic inflammatory skin diseases, affecting around 250,000 people in Austria. While previous treatment approaches have mainly focused on inhibiting ...

Cold Sore Discovery IDs Unknown Trigger for Those Annoying Flare-Ups

Feb. 28, 2025 — Scientists have a new target to prevent cold sores -- and genital herpes flare-ups caused by the same virus -- after researchers discovered an unexpected way the herpes virus re-activates in the ...

From Dormant to Danger: How VZV Reactivation Is Driving Central Nervous System Infections

Feb. 27, 2025 — Researchers observed a rise in adult central nervous system (CNS) infections, primarily aseptic meningitis caused by the varicella zoster virus (VZV), post-2019. The researchers highlighted the ...

Research Suggests Common Viral Infection Worsens Deadly Condition Among Premature Babies

Feb. 24, 2025 — Researchers say they found that infection with a common virus that can be transmitted from mother to fetus before birth significantly worsens an often-fatal complication of premature birth called ...

New Therapy May Effectively Control HIV in Uganda

Feb. 19, 2025 — A multi-national, multi-institutional study investigators found little natural resistance to a new HIV therapy called lenacapavir in a population of patients in ...

New Research Shows Neonatal HSV Infections May Lead to Long-Term Cognitive Impairment

Feb. 19, 2025 — Very early exposure to even a very small dose of herpes simplex virus (HSV) in infant mice can lead to cognitive decline later in life, according to new findings. This is significant because of ...

Speculum Exams Unnecessary for HPV Screening

Feb. 14, 2025 — Researchers have demonstrated that self-sampling is just as effective as speculum-based testing for HPV ...