How Is Blue Waffle Disease Spread?

How is blue waffle disease spread? Over the internet, basically.

The source I quoted earlier, Chris Attakk, is a pseudonymous commenter on a poorly-written and unresearched spin article I found online. There were at least a hundred commenters, many warning of the dangers of the "disease" — but actual medical opinion is pretty clear that it doesn’t really exist.

Here, for contrast, is Dr Amy Whittaker. She didn’t get that "Dr" over the internet, and it’s not a Phd; Dr Whittaker is Assistant Professor of Obstetrics/Gynecology at the University of Chicago Hospital. Obviously, that doesn’t mean we should unquestioningly believe everything she says, but when she talk about her area of expertise we should listen.

So What Do Real Doctors Say?

"There is no disease known as 'blue waffle disease', in the medical world." That’s pretty unequivocal.

What about Chris Attakk’s idea that several venereal diseases might together be responsible for the appearance of "blue waffle disease"? "There is no disease that causes a blue appearance on the external genitalia." Again, not really an "open to interpretation" kind of a response. According to Dr Whittaker:

In fact, blue waffle disease has taken on an afterlife of its own: not only is it now widely believed-in among young people despite the overwhelming medical consensus that the only piece of evidence that it exists is an unconvincing fake, but it also plays the part of a prank whose aim is simply to get people to look at the original photo. It’s not hard to find on Google, but it is extremely unpleasant to look at, the more so when we consider that, according to Dr Whittaker, "a bluish appearance to external genitalia could be from bruising, which could result from force, most likely from a sexual assault." On balance, then, we should be glad that it’s probably totally fake.

To summarize: real STDs are bad enough. Access to condoms and an understanding that an unwanted pregnancy isn’t the only unintended consequence of sex is important, not because you might catch blue waffle disease, but because you might catch one of the dozen or so real STDs that can lead to chronic pain, infertility, death or the horrifying symptoms of tertiary syphilis, for instance. Ms McBride was right to be concerned, in that sense, even if a little fact-checking could have saved her a red face.

See Also: Afraid Of Getting Your Girlfriend Pregnant? Here's What Teens Need To Know

If you have something to add, please get hold of me in the comments section below!