Infants Born to Women With Chlamydia trachomatis Infection

Sir.—Schaefer et al¹ have provided an interesting comparative study of 61 infants whose mothers had Chlamydia trachomatis cultured from the cervix at some time between the 20th and 36th week of gestation and 183 infants whose mothers' cultures were negative for C trachomatis. They concluded that infants born to women with positive cultures were more likely to have pneumonitis and unspecified viral illness in the first six months of life, early otitis media, and gastroenteritis following pneumonitis than the infants of women with negative cultures. Previous investigations have sought and not found a significant increase in respiratory illness and otitis media in infants whose cultures are positive for Chlamydia at birth.^2,3 It may be that the findings in Schaefer and colleagues' study differ from those of others because of certain assumptions made by Schaefer et al:

1. There is no mention in this study as to whether