LONDON, Dec 15 (AFP) - The number of cases of sexually transmitted diseases in Britain has reached a 10-year high, according to figures published Friday.

Rates of chlamydia and gonorrhoea in particular rose dramatically over the past five years, according to the Public Health Laboratory Service.

Experts warned that complacency about safe sex messages had led to soaring rates of infection among young women and gay men.

The figures showed rates of sexually transmitted infections had stabilised in the early 1990s but increased massively since 1995.

Diagnoses of genital chlamydia have risen 76 percent since 1995, gonorrhoea 55 percent and syphilis 54 percent.

Kevin Fenton of the Laboratory Service said: "A worrying trend is emerging from these figures.

"It suggests that changes in sexual behaviour thought to be related to the extensive safer sex messages in the wake of the HIV epidemic (the virus which causes AIDS) have not been sustained."

Professor Michael Adler, a government adviser on sexual health issues, said the message about risks associated with sex was not getting through.

"There's no doubt we have a public health problem in relation to sexually transmitted infections," he added on BBC radio. "Last year we saw the largest number of new HIV infections that we have ever seen."

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