AAP News Vol. 13 No. 3 March 1997, p. 26
© 1997 American Academy of Pediatrics
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Of lice and men: bureaucratic nit-pickers bug M.D

Jeffrey S. Penso M.D., FAAP

Pediculosis capitis, the human hair louse, is well represented on the scalps of American schoolchildren.

While always with us, the pest rarely causes serious health problems and is readily eradicated by a brief application of permethrin to the scalp.

Why then the great concern about the common louse? Certainly parents are not enthused to see small creatures walking on the heads of their offspring. Perhaps we recognize the great antiquity of this scourge, one of the plagues of Egypt. However biblical this creature, it is not the clergy, but rather the education establishment that is perplexed by lice.