From the Departments of Venereologyt, Bristol Royal Infirmary, and the Royal United Hospital, Bath, the Public Health Laboratory*, Bristol, and the Family Planning Association Clinict, Bristol Royal InfirmaryThe first genital tract isolates of Chlamydia A were obtained from parents of babies suffering from TRIC ophthalmia neonatorum, by growth in the yolk sac of fertile eggs (Jones, Collier, and Smith, 1959;Jones, Al-Hussaini, and Dunlop, 1964). It was noted that the fathers of these babies were frequently suffering from non-gonococcal urethritis (NGU) and that the mothers often showed changes in the cervix. The isolation of Chlamydia from two of nine unselected males suffering from NGU confirmed the association of these organisms with non-specific genital infection (Dunlop, Al-Hussaini, Garland, Treharne, Harper, and Jones, 1965 (Dunlop, Vaughan-Jackson, Darougar, and Jones, 1972;Oriel, Reeve, Powis, Miller, and Nicol, 1972;Richmond, Hilton, and Clarke, 1972) and that they are only rarely isolated from equally promiscuous men without urethritis (Oriel and others, 1972; Richmond and others, 1972).However, a similar isolation rate was shown in men suffering from gonorrhoea (G) (Richmond and others, 1972) which threw doubt on whether a chlamydial infection was the initial cause of NGU, and raised the possibility that urethritis of any cause activated an existing but quiescent chlamydial infection in the male urethra. This activated infection appeared to be pathogenic since Chlamydia-positive patients with G were much more prone to develop post-gonococcal urethritis (PGU) than Chlamydia-negative G patients, and since the isolation rate of Chlamydia in men with NGU who had a long-standing untreated urethral

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Of 277 non-pregnant women, 67 (24%) harboured Candida albicans in the genital tract. Of 56 women yielding C albicans who had no other infection diagnosed, 14 were symptomless and 10 had no clinical signs of vulval redness, vaginitis, or discharge. Symptoms and signs tended to be more severe in women with higher yeast counts. Of 22 women with moderate or severe symptoms (pruritus with or without discharge) and signs, 15 had yeast counts of more than 10(3) colony forming units (cfu)/ml, whereas six of nine women with no symptoms or signs had counts of fewer than 10(3) cfu/ml.

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SUMMARY The resistogram method was applied to 420 isolates of Candida albicans obtained from 30 selected patients undergoing treatment for vulvovaginitis. Of these, 16 patients each harboured a particular strain of C. albicans which persisted in the mouth or intestinal tract or both. In three of these patients, this strain persisted in the genital tract, and, in eight patients, it later recolonised the genital tract. Fourteen patients harboured more than one strain of C. albicans: one failed to respond to treatment and continued to harbour the same strain in the genital tract; in five the original strain later recolonised the genital tract and a second strain remained confined to the mouth or intestinal tract or both; and in three a second strain, present in the intestinal tract, later colonised the genital tract. Each of the male partners of seven patients harboured a strain of C. albicans that was identical to the strain, or to one of the strains, that had been isolated from his female partner.