An orally consumable antibiotic called doxycycline can reduce sexually transmitted infections (STIs) by two-thirds in each the cases of gay sex and transgender women having unprotected sex given they take the medication inside 72 hours of the intercourse, a recent study found.

The findings, published within the Recent England Journal Of Medicine, noted that the combined incidences of gonorrhea, chlamydia and syphilis were cut by two-thirds in individuals who were taking doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis (doxy-PEP).

“Effective methods for stopping sexually transmitted infections are badly needed,” Hugh Auchincloss, M.D., National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) told Medical Express. “That is an encouraging finding that would help reduce the variety of sexually transmitted infections in populations most at-risk.”

The study also pointed toward a slight increase in anti-bacterial resistance, but further research is required to find out it.

Greater than 110 million incidents of sexually transmitted infections amongst men and girls within the U.S. were reported in 2008, amongst which about 22 million were in young men and girls aged between 15-24 years, as per estimates by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

In 2021, an estimated 2.5 million people reported syphilis, gonorrhea and chlamydia, up from 2.4 million cases in 2020, as per the CDC.

The most recent study, led by researchers from the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) and the University of Washington, Seattle, involved 501 adults. All of them were assigned male sex at birth and had sex with a person in a given yr. Researchers reviewed aspects like HIV diagnosis or if the participants were planning to take pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) medication to forestall HIV acquisition or in the event that they had an onset of gonorrhea, chlamydia or early syphilis before. After these assessments, it was found that 327 participants were taking HIV PrEP medications and 174 of them were living with HIV.

As a part of the study, a few of them got doxy-PEP of a 200 mg prescribed dose inside 24 hours but no later than 72 hours after unprotected sex. After quite a few trials and medical assessments, research doubled down on the efficacy of the medication in removing STIs.

“Given its demonstrated efficacy in several trials, doxy-PEP must be regarded as a part of a sexual health package for men who’ve sex with men and transwomen in the event that they have an increased risk of STIs,” Annie Luetkemeyer, M.D., professor of infectious diseases at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital at UCSF, and co-principal investigator of the study, told Medical Express.

“It’s going to be necessary to watch the impact of doxy-PEP on antimicrobial resistance patterns over time and weigh this against the demonstrated advantage of reduced STIs and associated decreased antibiotic use for STI treatment in men at elevated risk for recurrent STIs,” Luetkemeyer added.

Data collected by Superdrug Online Doctor shows the prevalence of STDs across space and time.
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