Data collected by a Greenland newspaper shows there has been a dramatic increase in the number of sexually transmitted diseases (STD) in the country. The Sermitsiaq article indicates there has been a rise of almost 100 per cent in the number of gonorrhoea cases reported.
The number of Greenlanders between 15 and 59 years old who contracted gonorrhoea was just 20 in 1,000 in 2007. Fast forward a few years and current statistics show the incidence rate is 38 cases per 1,000 people.
Health authorities in Greenland claim this means one in 26 of the sexually active adult population has gonorrhoea. The authority compared Greenland’s gonorrhoea epidemic with Denmark’s. The rate there is just one in 10,000 which equates to the fact Greenlanders are 300 times more likely to contract the disease.
Incidences of chlamydia in Greenland are also increasing although not as rapidly as those for gonorrhoea. Health officers allege the country’s nationals are having sex without taking basic precautions such as wearing condoms.
They say this practice could lead to an explosion of HIV cases in the country. Until now cases of the deadly disease have been few and far between, but with unsafe sex the norm nowadays it is believed the disease is lurking like a time-bomb.
On the other side of Baffin Bay, the Nunatsiaq News compared the surge in STDs to those in Nunavik and Nunavut. Nunavut in particular had a problem and witnessed a 200 per cent increase in cases of gonorrhoea over the two-year period from 2006 to 2008. Health officials tried to deal with the issue by encouraging condom use and giving them away free in health centres.