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Washington – The United States has set a record with more than 1 million cases of chlamydia, a sexually transmitted disease, being reported.

This is the most ever reported for a sexually transmitted disease according to federal health officials.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stated that more intensive screenings are the reason for the big increase in the number of cases.

Gonorrhea also saw rates rise after hitting a record low. Syphilis was also seen to rise for the first time in 15 years.

Dr. Khalil Ghanem stated “Hopefully we will not see this turn into a trend.”

Chlamydia was the most common STD with 1,031,000 cases, up from 976,000 one year ago.

This breaks the past record-holder gonorrhea which had 1,013,436 cases in 1978.

Syphilis is a potentially deadly disease which begins as genital sores. 9,800 cases were reported in 2006, up from 8,700 in 2005.

Chlamydia infection rates were found to be more than seven times higher in black women than whites, and twice as high in black women than Hispanics.

The infection can spread if not treated and can lead to infertility. It is easily treated if caught early. Since many women with it have no symptoms though it can be missed.