Bottled beverages and typhoid fever: the Mexican epidemic of 1972-73.

A chloramphenicol resistant strain of S. typhi which caused a very large epidemic of typhoid fever in Mexico in 1972-73 survived in opened bottles of one carbonated drink with a pH of 4.6 for two weeks and in another such drink with a pH of 5.1 for six months. Bottled beverages are potential sources of large outbreaks of enteric disease, and deserve the same type of standards sand monitoring as comparable fluids such as milk.

[Family planning in a suburban development of Mexico City]. / Planificación familiar en una colonia marginada de la cuidad de México.

PIP: To study the prevalence of contraceptive use among women in reproductive age, 15-50, and living in urban slums, the female population of Colonia Ajusco was surveyed. Colonia Ajusco is situated south of Mexico City; 70% of its population comes from the interior of the country; there is no drinkable water and no sewage system; housing conditions and urban services are very poor. 606 women were investigated; 58% of them were below age 36, and 53.5% were parity 4 and over. 56.4% used contraception; of these 36.7% used the IUD, 23.1% the pill, and 16.7% had been sterilized. The contraceptive method used seemed to be strictly related to the type of medical services used; women using the IUD were mostly patients of the Social Security medical services, while women using the pill were mostly clients of private physicians. There was no association between age and the method used. 88.4% of women not using contraception did not have easy availability of medical services. The percentage of women using contraception, 56.4% seems high in relation to other Latin American countries, but it is very low in relation to the percentage of contraceptive users in more developed countries (93% in England). The use of the IUD as the method of choice can be explained by several factors: the massive national advertising campaign, low cost, ease of insertion, and no need for sustained motivation to use contraception. From all studies on contraceptive prevalence in Mexico it appears that women start to regulate their fertility after the 1st child, or even after the 4th child. Women below 20 still tend to resort to illegal abortion.^ieng

Posibles danos a la salud de una comunidad abierta, por sales de cromo en el ambiente. IV. Investigacion en la poblacion de Lecheria-San Francisco Chilpan / Health damage caused by chromium salts in the environment in an open community. IV. Research in the population of the Lecheria-San Francisco Chilpan

Se presenta la investigacion efectuada en una comunidad abierta supuestamente expuesta durante varios anos a un ambiente fuertemente contaminado con sales de cromo, como resultado del defectuoso funcionamiento de una fabrica de cromatos en su proximidad. Se hizo un estudio medico-epidemiologico amplio de la poblacion. Ademas del examen medico en busca de lesiones que pudieran deberse a cromismo, se determino el cromo en la orina y el cabello. Tambien se incluyo la revision de la mortalidad por causa que pudiese estar relacionada con la intoxicacion por cromo en los cinco anos previos a la instalacion de la fabrica y en los 19 de su funcionamiento, tanto en la localidad problema como en una localidad testigo. Asimismo, se realizaron estudios del ambiente. Todo indico la ausencia de cromismo en la comunidad. Los autores concluyeron que la poblacion nunca habia estado expuesta a un ambiente contaminado con cromo. En esta ocasion se dio a la epidemiologia un uso nuevo o por lo menos poco usual. Generalmente se buscan danos en la poblacion. En la investigacion que se publica se empleo la epidemiologia para demostrar que era falso que la comunidad tuviese problemas de cromismo

Planificacion familiar en una colonia marginada de la ciudad de Mexico / Family planning in a slum area of Mexico city

Se investigo la tasa de prevalencia de planificacion familiar en mujeres casadas en edad fertil residentes en una area marginada del sur de la ciudad de Mexico. Se encontro una tasa de 56,4%; el metodo de control preferentemente usado era el dispositivo intrauterino. Un factor muy relacionado con el grupo de mujeres que no planifican era la falta de servicios medicos. Se presenta con fines ilustrativos una comparacion internacional y se discuten las posibles limitaciones de las campanas de planificacion en estos grupos de la poblacion