STD Rates in Missouri

Missouri sits in the upper tier of the country for sexually transmitted infections — 16th out of 50 states in 2023, with a combined STD rate of 722 per 100,000 people. That's about 13% above the national median. The headline number isn't the surprise, though. What's more interesting is that all three major STDs — chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis — declined in 2023 after years of relentless upward pressure. That kind of across-the-board pullback is worth paying attention to.

Chlamydia is Missouri's most common STD by volume: nearly 31,000 cases in 2023, at a rate of 498.6 per 100,000. That puts the state above the national median of 471.3, though just barely. The longer view is more telling — rates have climbed roughly 20% since 2009, peaking around 567 in 2018 before drifting downward. The 2023 rate, down 4.8% from 2022, is the lowest Missouri has seen since about 2015. Whether that's a genuine trend or a fluctuation is the open question.

Gonorrhea tells a sharper story. Missouri's 2023 rate of 201.9 per 100,000 is still 33% above the national median of 152.2 — and while that's actually a significant drop from the 2020 peak of 273.8, the long-run picture is hard to dismiss. Since 2009, the gonorrhea rate has risen 50%, from 108.5 to 201.9. Syphilis, by contrast, has had the most turbulent arc of the three. The rate was essentially zero in 2000 — 0.5 per 100,000 — and by 2022 it had reached 23.5. It pulled back to 21.5 in 2023, still nearly 45% above the national median of 14.8. That's a disease that barely existed in Missouri's data two decades ago.

HIV data for Missouri runs through 2022 and shows a state hovering around 500 new diagnoses per year, with a rate of roughly 9 to 10 per 100,000. The 2020 figure — 368 cases — likely reflects pandemic-era disruptions to testing and diagnosis rather than an actual decline in transmission. By 2021, cases rebounded to 544, the highest point in the dataset. If you live in Kansas City, Saint Louis, or Springfield — where STD burden tends to concentrate — knowing your status is the most useful thing the data suggests you can do. STDTest.com can help you find a location nearby.