On Dec 24, 19681 and again on April 2, 1969,2 the Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration had published in the Federal Register notifications implementing judgment of the NAS-NRC Drug Efficacy Study concerning fixed-dosage combinations of several anti-infective drugs. As might be expected, these actions have generated much discussion.
The therapeutic claims for these drugs were, in many instances, designated by the Panels on Antiinfective Drugs of the Drug Efficacy Study as being "ineffective as a fixed combination." It is not clear what this designation really means. The reports do not clearly reveal whether the panels were saying that these drug combinations in themselves fail to produce an intended effect or whether they represent something less than acceptable as rational therapeutic agents. For example, in its evaluation of the therapeutic claim of a penicillin-streptomycin combination in the treatment of bronchiectasis, bronchitis, and other respiratory infections, the panel judged