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This is Lindsay Smith Rogers.

There has been a huge increase in sexually transmitted infections over the past decade.

There are no vaccines, and many of these infections can be hard to treat.

Today, Stephanie Desmond talks to Dr. Matthew Hamill, an expert on STIs at Johns Hopkins,

about a new tool in the works, having people take a dose of antibiotics after sex to prevent infections

from starting. And research suggests it works for some. Let's listen. Matthew Hamill,

thanks so much for joining me. Oh, it's my pleasure, definitely. Thank you for inviting me along.

So you're an expert in sexually transmitted infections,

and I've been reading about something called doxypep, and I'm wondering if you can please explain

what that is. Of course. Doxy stands for doxycycline, which is an antibiotic that we use

to typically to treat infections, but also to prevent infections.

And PEP stands for post-exposure prophylaxis, which is a long series of words, but really what

the idea is that an individual will take an antibiotic doxycycline after a sexual exposure to try and prevent them acquiring a sexually

transmitting infection.

And what kinds of infections are we talking about specifically?

Yeah, so we're talking about bacterial sexually transmitted infections.

So that is chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis.

They're the three infections that have been studied in the context of doxycycline-Pet.

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