A comparative trial of co-trimoxazole and chloramphenicol in thyphoid and paratyphoid fever.

A comparative trial of co-trimoxazole and chloramphenicol was carried out on 91 patients, 57 having typhoid fever and 34 cases having paratyphoid fever. Co-trimoxazole is an effective drug in the treatment of enteric fevers with respect to clinical cure, absence of relapses and the mild nature of short term toxic drug effects. Unlike some of the earlier reports, treatment failure or non-responsiveness to the drug occurred in just under 10 per cent of the cases and would constitute a drawback of therapy with co-trimoxazole. This feature was not observed in the patients receiving chloramphenicol. The excretion of Salmonellae after drug therapy was more common with chloramphenicol than with co-trimoxazole, again indicating the value of the latter drug in the treatment of enteric fevers.