The Pennsylvania Department of Health (DOH) is urging mothers-to-be to get tested for syphilis to reverse the recent trend of babies being born with the disease.

The DOH says congenital syphilis occurs when a pregnant person with syphilis passes the infection on to the baby during pregnancy. It can cause miscarriages, stillbirths, premature births, low birth weight, or death shortly after birth.

According to the DOH, so far in 2022, there have been 12 confirmed cases of births with congenital syphilis in Pennsylvania, excluding Philadelphia, along with two stillbirths, making it the highest number of cases since 1990.

The number of congenital syphilis cases across the U.S. has risen steadily over the last eight years, growing from 334 in 2012 to 2,184 in 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).