Infertility

For women, symptoms can include an unusual vaginal discharge, pain when passing urine and lower abdominal pain or tenderness.

For men, they can include discharge from the tip of the penis, pain when passing urine or pain or tenderness in the testicles.

■ Genital warts - the most common STI, caused by the human papilloma virus.

Warts may take from two weeks to several months to appear after coming into contact with the virus.

They can appear on their own or in groups, internally or externally, and are often tiny and difficult to see.

They are usually painless but may occasionally itch or cause inflammation.

■ Syphilis - caused by bacteria.

Symptoms, which can be hard to recognise, include sores where the bacteria entered the body.

In first stage syphilis, sores usually appear three to four weeks after coming into contact with syphilis and they are highly infectious.

They may take two to six weeks to heal, by which time the bacteria will have spread to other parts of the body.

Second stage syphilis has symptoms including a painless rash spreading over the body, a flu-like illness, white patches on the tongue or roof of mouth and patchy hair loss.

If untreated, the third stage, during which there may be no new symptoms but the condition remains infectious, can last for the rest of someone's life.

It could cause serious damage to the heart, brain, eyes, i...

The company generates three-quarters of its sales from the multiple-sclerosis medicine Rebif, which was first sold in 1998, and fertility drug Gonal-f, the first biological copy of a follicle-stimulating hormone, that was approved for sale in 1995.

Rebif faces competition from new oral treatments as well as Elan Corp.'s Tysabri, which may return to the market in coming months.

First Signal The announcement ``is a first signal the company is not up for sale,'' Lombard Odier Darier Hentsch analyst Bob Pooler in Zurich said in a note to investors.

``The company will become more aggressive in strengthening its product portfolio to reduce the dependency on flagship MS treatment Rebif.'' The drugmaker has been buying products to revive growth and move into new disease areas such as oncology and dermatology.

It acquired rights to Genentech Inc.

and Xoma Ltd.'s psoriasis therapy Raptiva outside the U.S.

and Asia and experimental cancer drugs from companies including Genmab A/S and Rigel Pharmaceuticals Inc.

Some of the drugs the company bought as well as those it developed weren't successful.

Serono dropped the development of psoriasis treatment onercept and melanoma drug Canvaxin in April 2005 and The company had to pay $725 million last year...

In another third, problems with the man cause The remaining cases are caused by a combination of factors in the woman and man.

Sometimes the cause of When conventional treatments don't help, a couple may try in vitro fertilization (IVF).

In this procedure, the woman is usually given medication to increase the production of eggs.

Then, the eggs are removed and united in a specially prepared Petri dish with sperm (either from the male partner or a donor).

Some of the fertilized eggs (embryos) are placed back into the uterus.

Ideally, the embryos will implant in the uterine lining and continue to grow, leading to a birth.The American Society for Reproductive Medicine estimates more than 139,000 babies have been born in the U.S.

through IVF.

The average live birth rate after a single egg retrieval is about 29.9 percent.Using Donor Eggs Another option for some infertile couples is donor eggs.

Egg donation may be preferred by women who have poor quality eggs, have experienced premature menopause, have had their ova...