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This study indicates that a considerable number of patients with psychotic depression have unusually high levels of neutralizing antibody to herpes simplex
type 1 virus. These findings have recently been confirmed in another laboratory: a higher prevalence of complement fixing antibodies to the herpes group of viruses was found in patients with depressive psychosis and in patients with dementia than in controls. The fact that neither measles nor rubella antibody viruses are increased in psychotic depression rules out the possibility of a general change in circulating antibodies in these patients. Increased levels of neutralizing herpes simplex antibody were found in schizophrenia and a group of other psychiatric diseases (neurotic syndromes, personality disorders), but were less marked than in the depressed group. (Diagnostic criteria for the various categories are not presented.) It is suggested that attention be directed to a possible relationship between slow or latent virus infections in the central nervous system and psychiatric disorders as it has been in many neurological diseases of unknown origin.