Business Weekly - Cambridge, UK

Feeding on the fear and stigma attached to STIs that makes some people look for cures in the privacy of their own home, internet vendors are putting buyers' health at risk by providing inadequate information and advice through their online services.

"It may be easy and convenient to buy your own treatment on the internet but we think that people are taking significant risks in doing so," said Dr Roberto Vivancos who, together with Dr Yoon Loke and Dr Silke Schelenz from UEA's School of Medicine, Health Policy and Practice undertook the study whose results were published in the journal Biomedcentral Public Health.

"Treatment of sexually transmitted infections is not a simple one-off step of popping the pills or slapping on the creams.

"Some of these remedies will inevitably fail if sexual partners are not treated and if patients don't take steps to avoid re-infection."

The research found that less than a quarter of internet vendors gave information on potential side effects of their treatments and that less than a quarter provided advice on how to avoid transmission and becoming re-infected.

They also failed to say if their products would interfere with any prescription medicines that patients might be on, or if there might be harm to patients who were breastfeeding or pregnant.

Patients can also lose the ability to have children if gonorrhea and chlamydia are not properly treated.

The researchers also found that almost half of the products were claimed to be effective, but there was actually very little solid evidence from the vendors to back this up.

"Patients nowadays can easily buy kits from the internet to test themselves for sexually transmitted infections and they may be tempted to do the same when they need treatment," said Dr Vivancos.

"But the NHS offers a professional, confidential treatment service that is likely to be far better and cheaper than taking chances on an unproven internet remedy."