Experimental trachoma produced by cultured virus.

IN a previous paper (Collier, Duke-Elder, and Jones, 1958) we described the results of inoculating human volunteers with virus isolated by Collier and Sowa (1958) from a patient in the Gambia with trachoma. Three volunteers were inoculated by the conjunctival route, and in one, an anophthalmic man, an unequivocal infection was induced with all the conjunctival and laboratory signs of trachoma. The paramount importance of establishing the aetiology of this disease beyond all doubt required the inoculation of further human volunteers so that the course of the experimental infection in the cornea could be observed. At the same time, the opportunity was taken to test a strain of virus differing somewhat in morphology from that used for the first experiments.