Determinations of blood lipids in man and in animals have frequently been made, and several reports have recently been published on studies of the cholesterol content of the blood of children in health and in disease. Most of the determinations have been made on the blood of infants under 2 years of age. The determination of lipids reported in the present study were made on the blood plasma of normal children of various ages and on that of children with scarlet fever and with rheumatic disease. The investigation was undertaken to see if the values for blood lipids in children with scarlet fever and with rheumatic disease differed from those obtained in similar studies on normal children.
It is a well established fact that the cholesterol content shows marked variations in certain diseases, notably, in diabetes and nephrosis. It has also been assumed that other pathologic conditions may influence the