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The Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) conducted a survey in 1998 to characterize its membership and to determine their needs. The response rate was 39%. Although only 23% of the respondents spent most of their time in the field of teaching and research, 62% of the respondents listed an academic institution as their primary employer. According to survey results, 17% of respondents indicated that care of HIV-infected patients comprised one-half or more of their practices. Respondents noted shortcomings in their training as a result of recent changes in the clinical practice arena and the health care system; more than one-fourth of the respondents identified deficits in their preparation for administration, infection control, pharmacoeconomics, quality assurance, transplantation, and outcomes research. This survey discloses that the IDSA membership perceives a need for changes in IDSA-sponsored fellowship training programs and graduate educational activities.

Disseminated infection with the rapidly growing mycobacteria Mycobacterium chelonae and Mycobacterium fortuitum is uncommon. Only eight cases were diagnosed at Duke University Medical Center (Durham, NC) over the last 14 years. We identified 46 other cases by review of the medical literature since 1960. We categorized these 54 cases into three groups according to underlying disease and outcome. Group 1 comprised patients with no identified immune defect, a kidney transplant, collagen vascular disease, or chronic renal failure; these patients usually presented with skin involvement and responded well to antimicrobial therapy (survival rate, 90%). Group 2 comprised patients with cell-mediated immune deficiency, lymphoma, or leukemia; they presented with widespread, multiorgan involvement and severe illness. The survival rate in this group was only 10%. Patients in group 3 (who had other underlying diseases) had intermediately severe illnesses and intermediate responses to therapy. These groups provide the basis for an understanding of disseminated infection secondary to rapidly growing mycobacteria and of the profound effect that unresolved immunosuppression has on survival.

Clinical Affairs Committee: Daniel J. Sexton, Chair, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina; Jeffery Band, William Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak Michigan; Steven Berman, University of Hawaii, Honolulu, Hawaii; John Bradley, Children's Hospital, San Diego, California; Joseph R. Dalovisio, Ochsner Clinic, New Orleans, Louisiana; Christopher Ingram, Raleigh Infectious Disease Associates, Raleigh, North Carolina; W. Patrick Joseph, ID Medical Group, San Ramon, California; Russell M. Petrak, Metro Infectious Disease Consultants, Hinsdale, Illinois; Thomas G. Slama, Hoosier Infectious Diseases, Indianapolis, Indiana; and Barbara H. Wade, Infectious Disease Associates, Pensacola, Florida.

We present four cases of disseminated zygomycosis that illustrate the characteristic clinical syndromes and natural history of this infection. The zygomycetes affect individuals immunosuppressed by age, drug therapy, or underlying disease. A previous splenectomy or deferoxamine therapy may be an additional factor in the development of disseminated zygomycosis. Clinical syndromes reflect vascular invasion and organ infarction. Diagnosis requires consideration of risk factors followed by biopsy of the affected organ for culture and for demonstration of broad nonseptate hyphae in tissue sections. Despite advances in the management of many bacterial and fungal infections in the immunosuppressed host, the results of therapy for disseminated zygomycosis remain dismal.

The life history of Epicauta lemniscata Fab. (order Coleoptera, family Meloidae) is given for southern Louisiana.

In experiments conducted in Southwestern Louisiana for the control of blister beetles on soybeans, calcium arsenate and Paris green were tried both as dusts and sprays with and without lime. These acted as repellents, giving no control. Dusting with sodium cyanide gave a very small percentage of control. Various contact insecticides were tried without success. Attraction to artificial light was small. In June 1925 applications of sodium fluosilicate (analyzed as sodium fluosilicate 97.90 to 98.10 by Bureau of Chemistry, U. S. D. A.) applied at the rate of 15 pounds per acre gave practically 100 per cent control. A mixture of equal parts by volume of sodium fluosilicate and hydrated lime gave practically the same results but did not kill so quickly as undiluted sodium fluosilicate.

Sugarcane is injured by the gnawing of the adult ( Euetheola rugiceps Lec.) into the underground stem of the young plant. Observations show that the number of sugarcane beetles in different places around a plantation varied from zero in woodlands to more than 100,000 per acre in pasture. Owing to the much greater number of early cane shoots produced by planting sugarcane in the summer rather than in the fall, the former practice affords a much better chance than the latter of producing a crop in the areas where the beetle is a serious problem.

The thirty-second annual meeting of the Cotton States Branch, E.H.A., was held in the Hotel Peabody, Memphis, Tennessee, on December 2, 3, 4, and 5, 1957. The meeting was heldin conjunction with the parent association of the Entomological Society of America. One hundred twenty-eight members and guests registered for the four-day meeting. Chairman Norman Allen opened the first of two branch business meetings promptly at 4:30 P.M. on December 2.

A survey of the sugar-cane fields of Louisiana showed the number of soil animals and root injury to be greatest on heavy soils. The most numerous of the injurious species in sugar-cane fields was Hanseniella unguiculata Bagnall, with Onychiurus armatus Tull., Japyx sp., Lepidocyrtus violentus Fols., and Zonitoides arboreus Say following in the order named. After extermination of soil animals normal numbers were reached again in two years.

MARSTON'S inventive and original use of music has never been recognized. The Children of St. Paul's and the Blackfriars, the two companies for whom he wrote his plays, were primarily choirboys, and dramatists had to allow them scope to display their musical talents. The music in these plays is generally regarded as a necessary evil-" the action was often interrupted by a song no more significant to the character of his circumstances than the irrelevancies of modern musical comedy ". It is too easy to dismiss music as extraneous, particularly in these plays in which it had to be used. The playwright must be judged on his use of material: the quality of an artist is shown in the way he rules his material where the lesser man is ruled by it. It is the mark of Marston's worth that he often transcends virtuosity and rises to artistic heights in his use of music. While his plays are not great drama-they are always superb theatre-they are extremely interesting as examples of the effective union of words, action and music. Of no play is this more true than of' Sophonisba '. The musical directions for 'Sophonisba' are unusually full, so much so that Marston is obliged to note: Let me intreat my reader not to taxe me for the fashion of the Entrances and Musique of this tragedy, for know it is printed onely as it was presented by the youths, & after the fashion of the private stage." The dramatic uses to which he puts music are of the same kind here as in his other plays, but in this note he is rather disclaiming responsibility for the choice of instruments and voices. It draws attention, as it were, to the partnership of writer and producer, seen at work from the beginning of the play. After a short scene where Syphax joins the Romans against Carthage, the scene shifts to Carthage and Sophonisba's awaiting Massinissa on her wedding night. To set the hymeneal tone Marston has a little masquing and singing, the point of which will only be seen later. The direction reads: " enter foure boyes antiquely attired with bows and quivers dancing to the Cornets, a phantastique measure ", after which Massinissa and his attendants enter with " Chorus with Cornets, Organ, and voices: Io to Hymen." A dramatic point follows when Cartholon bursts

Several insecticides were applied in a band along the drill at corn-planting time or soon after plants emerged for the control of the sugarcane beetle, Euetheola rugiceps (Lee.), in Mississippi. Aldrin and heptachlor granules and sprays at 1 pound per acre were the most effective and gave about equal control. Dieldrin was as effective as aldrin in a spray, but not in granules. Thiodan, Thimet, Guthion, Chlorthion, and Sevin were ineffective at the dosages used.

The newly discovered injury to sugarcane by a small weevil, Anacentrus sp., is described. The character of damage is the destruction of the eyes of sugarcane and also killing of the young plants.