[Epidemiology of human leptospirosis, with special reference to greater Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from 1970 to 1982].

From 1970 to 1982, 884 cases of human leptospirosis were serologically diagnosed at the Leptospirosis Laboratory, Fundação Oswaldo Cruz - FIOCRUZ, by means of the microscopic agglutination test. Of these patients, 775 were hospitalized in the city of Rio de Janeiro, and 109 were reported by other Brazilian cities. Icterohaemorrhagiae was the presumptive infecting serogroup most commonly encountered in greater Rio patients (76.4%) and in the others (41.3%). During this 13-year period, two Icterohaemorrhagiae strains were isolated. In greater Rio the illness predominated between January and April (53.7%), the male sex accounted for 89.9% of the cases, and patients ranging from 16 to 45 year-olds were the most affected (74.9%).