Here’s the good news about gonorrhea: It’s still a treatable sexually transmitted infection.

The bad news: It may not be for much longer.

Cases of antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea have been found in other parts of the world, including the UK, where the country’s chief medical officer Dame Sally Davies warned about the rise of “super gonorrhea” in a recent letter to physicians and pharmacies.

The highly adaptable disease, which has been around for more than 2,000 years, once responded to a range of antibiotics.

Now the options are far slimmer: the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends a dual treatment of two antibiotics, ceftriaxone and azithromycin as the only viable cure.

Genentech Inc., which was acquired by Swiss drug giant Roche Holding AG ROG, -0.97% in 2009, is the maker of ceftriaxone, under the brand name Rocephin.

Pfizer Inc. PFE, -0.69% is the maker of azithromycin, under the brand name Zithromax.

Left untreated — or absent treatment options, in the case of super gonorrhea — the disease’s bacteria infect reproductive mucous membranes, and can result in serious and even life-threatening complications including inflammation, pain, infertility and a deadly blood condition.

Cases of super gonorrhea were reported in England earlier this year, but no such treatment failures have been reported in the U.S., the CDC told MarketWatch.

Treatment of normal gonorrhea with only one medication, cefixime — which the CDC once recommended but no longer does — can result in antibiotic-resistant strains of the disease, a concern that prompted the letter from Davies.

Gonorrhea samples that have some cefixime resistance have been identified in “a few sporadic samples” from the U.S., the CDC said.

So while it’s possible super gonorrhea could exist or develop in America, the dual antibiotic treatment still works here — for now.

The bad news is that if a strain of antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea should develop or rear its head in the U.S., there’s not a lot that can currently be done.

New remedies are in development but bringing drugs to market is a drawn-out, years-long process.

This very predicament was the subject of a 2012 CDC-funded study, ominously termed “The Emerging Threat of Untreatable Gonococcal Infection.”

Other than abstinence, the best weapons against gonorrhea — the second most common STI after chlamydia — are condom use, which reduces the risk, and regular STI screenings, especially since many people with gonorrhea don’t show symptoms and thus may not know they have the disease.

Yearly gonorrhea screenings are recommended by the CDC for sexually active women under age 25 and sexually active gay and bisexual men.

Unusual symptoms in the genital area such as colored discharges, rashes or burning sensations while urinating should prompt an immediate visit to the doctor. But gonorrhea can also appear anywhere sexual contact has occurred, including the throat and anus.

In the U.S., rates of gonorrhea have been on a dramatic decline for decades, until they began inching up starting in 2009.

About 820,000 new cases of gonorrhea are reported annually, according to Planned Parenthood.

Globally, some clinics report gonorrhea rates as high as 20% among adults, with a rate closer to 50% among commercial sex workers, according to a WHO report.