Treatment of B-Hemolytic Streptoccal Infection

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Abstract
THERE IS little doubt that penicillin must be considered the drug of first choice in the management of β-hemolytic streptococcal infections. The efficacy of penicillin in the eradication of β-hemolytic streptococci and the resultant prevention of their most dreaded sequelae—rheumatic fever and glomerulonephritis—are widely recognized and accepted.1-6 There is equally as little doubt that it would be highly desirable to have a satisfactory alternative agent for the increasing number of patients who have become sensitized to penicillin, often through the injudicious use of this antibiotic in minor upper respiratory conditions. The broad-spectrum antibiotics have not proved uniformly effective against β-hemolytic streptococci7-9; in addition, their use should be held to a practical minimum so as not to endow the pediatric patient with strains resistant to these antimicrobials which may be indispensable later in his life. Although the sulfonamides have proved quite effective in the prevention of β-hemolytic streptococcal infections,