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Patients with untreated Hodgkin's Disease (HD) often show T-cell dysfunction irrespective of the stage and grade of the disease. Our earlier studies have shown defective mitogen induced blastogenic responses of PHA activated peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMNC-blood lymphocytes) from untreated HD patients (Moghe et al., 1980) and their reduced ability to form T-cell colonies in capillaries in soft agar (Mukhopadhyaya et al., 1983). An interesting aspect of T-cell immunoregulation in HD, is the possibility of abnormal distribution of immunoreactive and immunoregulatory cells in the lymphoid compartments (DeSouza et al., 1977). In this respect, we and others have earlier investigated the subsets of T-cells in involved and uninvolved splenic mononuclear cells (SMNC-spleen lymphocytes) of HD patients, as assessed by the expression of receptors for IgG (Ty) and IgM (Tj) or reactivity to monoclonal antibodies. The results indicated that, in untreated HD, while blood lymphocytes showed increased suppressor cells and decreased helper cells, the spleen lymphocytes showed a higher proportion of helper cells sequestered in this tissue (Gupta et al., 1980; Herrman et al., 1983; Gulwani et al., 1985). Enriched Ty populations from blood and spleen lymphocytes exerted suppressor effects on responding T-cells in vitro (Gulwani et al., 1986). It is now well established that availability of interleukin-2 (IL-2) and expression of IL-2 receptors (IL-2R) by activated T-lymphocytes determine their degree of proliferation (Robb, 1984). We have shown that T-cells from blood lymphocytes of untreated HD patients responded well to PHA in the presence of exogenous IL-2. However, there was no improvement in their colony forming ability (Mukhopadhyaya et al., 1987). The activation of peripheral blood T-lymphocytes by IL-2 in treated disease-free HD patients has been investigated by Mantovani et al. (1987). However, there are hardly any reports which compare the IL-2 mediated regulation of T-cell activation in blood and spleen lymphocytes. Such studies might help toward a better understanding of T-cell hyporesponsiveness and support the possibility of the existence of ecotaxis in this disease. In this report we have compared the reactivity of spleen and blood lymphocytes from untreated HD patients using the following parameters: (i) blastogenic and colony forming potential of PHA activated T-cells; (ii) their responses to exogenous IL-2; and (iii) their ability to generate IL-2 and express IL-2R.