Investigation of Chlamydia pneumoniae (TWAR) antibodies in paired sera of 120 patients with various respiratory diseases revealed a prevalence of 4.2% of IgG seroconversion. IgG antibody without seroconversion was found in 83.3%. Sera of ten patients showed titers as high as 512-1024 or above. Children with no respiratory disease and blood donors in Budapest had specific IgG in 46.5% and 75.2% respectively. Prevalence of IgG antibody in children from the rural areas of Hungary was about 50% lower than in children in the capital. The high prevalence of persistent IgG, indicating earlier infection, suggests that Chlamydia pneumoniae infection may be endemic in Budapest. The small number of the serologically confirmed acute infections in hospitalized patients with pneumonia leads to the conclusion that the majority of patients with chlamydial pneumonia responds to the therapeutic regimen administered by the general practitioner and referral to hospital rarely becomes necessary.

Three liver biopsies were carried out in a case of chronic active hepatitis with persistent HB-antigenemia. Virus-cores could not be detected in the liver cell nuclei by electron microscopy before immunosuppressive therapy. Intranuclear, ring-shaped virus-cores of 20-25 nm diameter appeared in almost every hepatocyte examined during immunosuppression.

Two potent third-generation cephalosporins with similar antibacterial spectra but different pharmacokinetics were compared in patients suffering from septicemia due to different organismus. Sixty patients with a variety of underlying diseases were included in the study. They received either 2–4 g ceftriaxone (active ingredient of Rocephin^TM) once a day or 2 g cefotaxime every 8 h for 10–15 days. Our data confirm that a single dose of 2 g ceftriaxone should be sufficient to treat septicemia.