New combination of antibiotics for treatment of contaminated specimens for viral studies.

A study of a new combination of antibiotics (sodium oxacillin, colistin sulfate, and amphotericin B) has shown that 30 mug/ml of each in tissue culture maintenance medium can inhibit a group of the commonest bacterial and fungal contaminants while causing no observable cytopathology in rhesus monkey kidney, HeLa, or human amnion tissue cells. In addition, there was no inhibition of the titers of poliovirus, echovirus, coxsackievirus, and adenovirus in the three cell lines. Ten duplicate fecal samples, which remained contaminated with fungal or Pseudomonas organisms after treatment with penicillin and streptomycin, were treated with the new antibiotic combination. Contaminants were controlled in each, and a variety of viruses was recovered.