Gonorrhoea and syphilis hit record levels across Europe, ECDC warns
The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) said this week, in its 2025 sexually transmitted infections report, that gonorrhoea and syphilis have reached the highest recorded levels in Europe. According to data drawn from 30 EU and EEA countries, gonorrhoea cases rose 31% in 2025 compared with 2024, and syphilis cases rose 13%.
The sharpest rises were recorded in people aged 15-24. ECDC's head of sexually transmitted infections, Andrea Ammon, told a press briefing that 'young people are at the heart of this surge — half of all gonorrhoea cases were recorded in this age group.' Ammon also said the annual gonorrhoea rate was 51 per 100,000 people across the surveyed countries, a fourfold increase since the report's modern series began in 2009.
The rise in syphilis cases produced parallel concern. The ECDC has historically tracked syphilis as highest among men who have sex with men in large cities; in 2025, however, the annual rise among heterosexual women approached 20%. There was also an increase in congenital syphilis cases in newborns — 247 congenital cases were reported, a 28% rise on 2024.
The report attributed part of the rise to a recovery in social and sexual activity following the COVID-19 period, while warning that antibiotic-resistant gonorrhoea strains continue to spread. ECDC said that 'extensive-resistant' strains have been detected in a handful of EU countries; cases resistant to the last available treatments have appeared in the United Kingdom, Norway and a small number of other countries.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) data corroborates the ECDC report. UKHSA submissions show 87,640 gonorrhoea diagnoses in England in 2025 — the highest since modern record-keeping began. UKHSA director Susan Hopkins told the BBC: 'One of the primary causes is a decline in condom use; another is capacity constraints in the NHS's broader screening and partner-notification services.'
The ECDC stressed that part of the rise may reflect improved reporting rather than purely a real increase. The spread of digital sexual-health platforms and home testing kit sales has expanded case detection. 'This is, on its own, good news — more people are being tested,' the authors wrote. 'But disentangling true epidemiological rise from improved reporting requires additional modelling.'
On treatment, resistance to ceftriaxone — the front-line antibiotic for gonorrhoea — has been climbing slowly but steadily over the past five years. The World Health Organization's antimicrobial resistance action plan this year listed gonorrhoea in the 'critical' category. ECDC has urged countries to strengthen their resistance surveillance and accelerate integration into the European Surveillance System (TESSy).
At the clinical level, one of the report's most practical recommendations is to strengthen routine partner-notification programmes. ECDC said partner notification should be part of every country's national sexual-health strategy, and that publicly subsidised home testing has high long-term cost-effectiveness.
Country-level outcomes vary widely. In Norway and Finland — which run intensive testing — the rise in gonorrhoea exceeded 50%, most likely reflecting more people being diagnosed. For non-EU European neighbours, including Turkey, the ECDC continues to invite participation in its surveillance system; Turkey's Ministry of Health has not yet adopted UKHSA-style comprehensive STI reporting although its 2025 year-end report is expected later this year.
The ECDC's public-facing message was summed up succinctly: 'Protection, testing, partner notification — these three steps form a chain that, if any link is broken, has limited effect. Testing should be free and confidential; that is also the most cost-effective public-health investment.' In the UK, the NHS has announced a comprehensive autumn sexual-health campaign.