There's been a sharp increase in the number of cases of the sexually transmitted infection gonorrhoea - up 25% in 2011.

It is also becoming harder to find antibiotics that treat it, which has raised the prospect that it could soon become untreatable.

Professor Cathy Ison, head of the National Reference Laboratory for Gonorrhoea which is part of Public Health England, told the Today programme: "Hopefully by raising awareness we can at least buy some time and look at new ways in which we can prevent it from becoming untreatable."

"But there is a possibility that if we don't do something then it could become untreatable by 2015."

First broadcast on the Today programme on Tuesday 23 April.