To the Editor: In a recent issue of your journal, Mellman et al1 demonstrated no chromosomal aberrations via the peripheral leukocytes of six infants with the rubella syndrome. We would like to add to those six cases, 20 infants with the rubella syndrome on whom chromosomal studies were also done.
All of these infants were born during the 1964 rubella epidemic in Atlanta. Thirteen mothers had a clinical course consistent with rubella during their first trimester of pregnancy and seven others had known exposure but no clinical illness. The stigmata in the infants included 16 instances of patent ductus arteriosus with or without other cardiac defects and two instances with other cardiac defects. Microphthalmia or cataracts or both were present in 11 infants and microcephaly in six others. Several infants also had other defects such as hearing loss and hepatosplenomegaly. Although no viral or serological studies were done, we