Infective Hepatitis and Cirrhosis of the Liver1

The role played by infective hepatitis in the causation of cirrhosis of the liver has yet to be fully ascertained. Owing to the lack of a susceptible laboratory animal the. problem cannot be settled by the experimental method. A solution is possible only by clinical and pathological studies from different parts of the world where the disease occurs against different backgrounds. For this reason a clinical study of a series of cases of infective hepatitis met with in Ceylon is here reported with special reference to the complications leading to cirrhosis.