On this date in 1944, the U.S. Public Health Service announced that gonorrhea, the most common venereal disease at the time, could be cured within eight hours with penicillin. In spite of the effect of antibiotics, sexually transmitted diseases remain among the most common infectious diseases in the U.S. The Institute of Medicine reports that sexually transmitted diseases, including syphilis, gonorrhea, chlamydia, Hepatitis B and AIDS, are diagnosed 12 million times a year in the United States.

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