Molecular diagnostics for Gonorrhoea: Implications for antimicrobial resistance and the threat of untreatable Gonorrhoea
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is making the clinical management of infections such as gonorrhoea increasingly difficult worldwide. In between the discovery of penicillin and the emergence of multidrug resistant (MDR-NG) and extensively drug resistant (XDR-NG) strains, gonorrhoea was considered unpleasant, but not particularly serious, because it was easily treated. Experts increasingly describe N. gonorrhoeae as becoming an untreatable superbug because of reports of MDR-NG and XDR-NG strains resulting in treatment failures with extended spectrum cephalosporins (ESCs), such as cefixime and ceftriaxone, from Europe, North America, Asia, and Africa.