Health care providers should consider prescribing the antibiotic doxycycline as a way to prevent some sexually transmitted infections (STIs), according to a draft recommendation that was posted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) last week.

"The purpose of the proposed guidelines is to provide updated clinical guidance for healthcare providers to inform the use of doxycycline PEP for preventing bacterial STI infections," the health agency's document reads, referring primarily to bacterial infections such as chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis.

The antibiotic "should be implemented in the context of a comprehensive sexual health approach including risk reduction counseling, STI screening and treatment, recommended vaccination, and linkage to HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), HIV care, or other services, as appropriate," according to the draft.

"Current data suggest overall benefit of the use of doxycycline PEP, but potential risks related to the development of resistance and impacts on the microbiome will need to be closely monitored after implementation of these guidelines," the CDC stated.

Doxycycline, which was first developed by Pfizer decades ago and is within the tetracycline spectrum of antibiotics, has been used as a prophylactic against several infectious diseases, including Lyme disease and malaria. It can be used as a first-line treatment for chlamydia and is sometimes used to treat syphilis.