Low dose glucantime therapy in Leishmania viannia braziliensis (Lvb) infections.

Good drug trials in leishmaniasis with carefully controlled groups are rare. Recently Ballou et al1 were able to establish that 20mg Sbv/kg body wt for 20 days was more efficacious in closing leishmanial ulcers due to Leishmania braziliensis panamensis than lOmg Sb¥/kg/body wt for a similar period. Conditions for this trial were much more favourable than those where we work namely field clinics in the cacao growing region of Bahia, Brazil. Here almost all human infec­ tions are due to Lvb. We have had primitive field clinic facilities and an ovewhelming press of patients. In 1984 an epidemic occurred in the region of Corte de Pedra where the incidence figure for 1984 reached 83 patients per 1,000 with acute cutaneous ulceration due to Lvb4 (França et al, in press).