Medicine: Penicillin by Mouth
Five Cornell Medical School researchers, headed by Dr. Walsh McDermott, last week presented evidence in Science that penicillin can be swallowed any old way, not just in capsules to protect the drug from stomach juices (TIME, Feb. 26).
No matter how it was taken, penicillin promptly turned up in the blood. When unprotected penicillin was given to twelve pneumonia patients, they got well just as fast as they would have on injections. Only hitch: dosage must be five times the amount required when the drug is administered by injection. But WPB announced last week that there will soon be plenty of penicillin for everybody.
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