Introduction of HAART Partially Responsible for Resurgence in Syphilis

THURSDAY, April 30, 2026 (HealthDay News) -- Introduction of the highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) drug regimen was partially responsible for the recent resurgence in syphilis in the United States, according to a study published online April 22 in Health Economics.Noting that the incidence of syphilis increased starting in 2000, recently reaching a 60-year peak, David Beheshti, Ph.D., from the University of Texas at San Antonio, and colleagues suggest that the increase was partly due to introduction of the HAART drug regimen, which transformed HIV from a terminal condition into a manageable chronic disease. To test this empirically, variation in HAART uptake was exploited based on spatial variation in pre‐HAART AIDS prevalence, sex, and time in a triple differences framework.The researchers found that a one standard deviation increase in the pre-HAART prevalence of AIDS led to a 17.8 percent increase in the rate of syphilis incidence. Between 1996 and 2008, there would have been 81 percent fewer syphilis cases in the absence of HAART."With syphilis now at a 60‐year high, these findings offer timely insight into how life‐saving innovations can reshape population behavior and highlight the need for complementary public health strategies," Beheshti said in a statement.Abstract/Full Text.Sign up for our weekly HealthDay newsletter

Introduction of HAART Partially Responsible for Resurgence in Syphilis

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