Medicine: Fall of the Hair

For the first International Congress on the Biology of the Hair Follicle and the Growth of Hair, 270 physicians and other scientists from three continents gathered in London last week, debated highly technical questions of how and why hair grows —and, in the aging male, so often falls out. None of the experts could suggest any preventive or cure for baldness, but by the end of the conference they had practically convinced themselves that there is really no problem. Summed up the University of Chicago's Dr. Stephen Rothman: "I do not know of a single instance where a man's social happiness or professional advancement has been hindered because of thinning or absent hair. Think of Julius Caesar and President Eisenhower!"