In the winter of 1943-1944 there was an unusual prevalence of ringworm of the scalp among school children in certain cities in Pennsylvania, New York and other Eastern states. A number of the state and city health officers requested that the Public Health Service send consultants from the Dermatoses Section of the Industrial Hygiene Division to recommend methods for remedying the conditions. At that time the customary method of control was either the exclusion of infected children from school or their isolation in certain schools. The treatment of the disease was usually by x-ray epilation. The consultant from the Public Health Service did not advocate these methods of control because keeping infected children from attending school would not prevent them from spreading the infection by contact outside of school, on the streets, playgrounds and the like, and he did not advocate treatments by x-ray epilation because in most communities there