Up from a Count of Nine

When the members of the American Academy of Dermatology and Syphilology met in Chicago last week, many thought that the time had come to drop the "and Syphilology" from the group's cumbersome title. After all, penicillin has been knocking out syphilis right & left, and modern treatment (one to five shots) can easily be given by general practitioners. It looked as though syphilis no longer required the services of specialists, or even much attention. Some hospitals reported difficulty getting enough cases for long term research.

Before the week was well along, the specialists changed their minds. Syphilis, they heard, had gone down for a count of nine but is now up and swinging again. Reported Dr. John C. Cutler of the U.S. Public Health Service: in the last fiscal year, 15 states* and the District of Columbia have reported increases in the number of cases of syphilis.

One reason for the resurgence of syphilis is that wide publicity for quickie cures has made potential victims careless. Also, said New York University's Dx. Charles R. Rein, federal and state funds for detecting and treating the disease have been cut back too fast. Some state laboratories are no longer making the wholesale, routine blood tests that they used to make. The result is that many early cases are being missed, and will be neglected until they do perhaps lasting damage.

Dr. Cutler summed it up: "We are still faced with a tremendous problem . . . of approximately 2,100,000 cases of untreated or inadequately treated syphilis."

* Arizona, Connecticut, Louisiana, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.