Chlamydial Infections

CURRENTLY, what might be called the fifth epidemic of interest in the chlamydiae is occurring. Investigation of this large, diverse group of micro-organisms containing a number of pathogens that are important in both human and animal diseases was initiated in the first decade of this century by Halberstaedter and Prowazek, who found characteristic intracytoplasmic inclusions in the conjunctival scrapings from patients with trachoma.1 Identical inclusions were found in the conjunctivas of neonates with an amicrobial form of ophthalmia neonatorum, and in cells of the genital tracts of some of these infants' parents who had urethritis or . . .