Mark King has had the clap so many times he’s renamed it ‘the applause’. The first time King had gonorrhoea, he was a teenager in the late 1970s, growing up with his five siblings in Louisiana.

He had the telltale signs: burning and discomfort when he urinated and a thick discharge that left a stain in his underwear.

King visited a clinic and gave a fake name and phone number. He was treated quickly with antibiotics and sent on his way.