Effectiveness of the treatment of sexually transmitted diseases instituted by local authorities of the Western Cape.
It is a strange paradox that now that the treatment of venereal diseases is comparatively painless, effective and easily available, there has been a considerable upsurge in the incidence thereof. A global picture of the success of preventive and curative measures is difficult to obtain since comprehensive statistics are not available. The single most important reason for this is that these diseases are not notifiable, whether treated in the clinics of local authorities or hospital environs or by private practitioners, making the detection of accurate epidemiological trends extremely difficult. Since patients often desire anonymity, there has been an increasing drift towards treatment at the last two sources mentioned above. This article studies the only available recorded information, and hence summarizes the effectiveness of the Cape Town City Council and Cape Divisional Council health departments in combating sexually transmitted diseases in the Western Cape.
D000554:Ambulatory Care Facilities; D006801:Humans; D012749:Sexually Transmitted Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000517:prevention & control*; D013019:South Africa