Tours Source Of V.D. Increase

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32393, 4 September 1970, Page 13

Tours Source Of V.D. Increase

(N.Z. Preu Association—Copyright) LONDON, September 3. Package holidays in the sun—the most cherished of modern British luxuries—are a major factor in driving up the venereal disease rate in London to near epidemic proportions, according to a report which has just been issued.

Official figures show that; the incidence of gonorrhea in Britain is the highest for 25 years. The Government’s chief medical adviser, Sir George Godber, will present a report on the situation in the next few weeks, and according to Ministry of Health sources it will contain some surprising figures. The sources quote Sir George Godber as saying that about 230,000 new patients aV tended treatment clinics in 1969—more than double the usual annual increase. In the latest report of the International Planned Parenthood Federation, issued this week, Dr Robert Catterall, one of Britain’s leading venereologists said that the situation was “completely out of control.” “The mobile society is also the promiscuous society,” he said. “Package holidays are an import source of infection.”

Every year nearly three million Britons head for the sunshine of southern Europe, many young people taking advantage of the package-tour scheme. Dr Catterall, the director of the department of venereology at Middlesex Hospital, told reporters: “It is the young who are most at risk. Many go abroad on their own

ind the sunshine and the cheap wine can be a bit too much for some.” The birth control pill was also partly responsible he said. “It is provable that its widespread use increases sexual activity in women and leads to greater promiscuity. “If we are going to have a permissive and liberal society we have to expect casualties," said Dr Catterall.