[Typhoid fever in south Vietnam to day (author's transl)].

In South Vietnam, the first Salmonella typhi resistant to chloramphenicol were isolated at the end of 1971; this resistance spread rapidly to two-thirds of S. typhi isolated; it is due to resistance plasmids which parasite most strains of S. typhi identified in Vietnam. The typhoid endemy turned into an epidemic en 1972. The clinical symptoms of typhoid fever remained just as few as before: often only a high temperature; splenomegaly is rare, hepatomegaly more frequent. Complications, specially associated ones, have been more frequently observed since 1972; the evolution of the disease is slower. Although costly, a high dose of ampicillin often proves clinically active. For the moment, an association of trimethoprime and sulfamethoxazole remains the least expensive of efficient treatments.