Abstract
For the past 30 years our incomplete understanding of perinatally acquired herpes infections has resulted in controversy. The lack of adequate data led to practice recommendations that have recently been changed regarding patients with recurrent herpes infection.<sup>1,2</sup>We now recognize that most cases of neonatal herpes infections are not preventable with current approaches.<sup>3</sup> From the late 1960s until the mid 1980s, the practice recommendation to prevent neonatal herpes consisted of performing weekly herpes cultures of the lower genital tract in women with a previous history of herpes followed by a cesarean delivery if lesions were present or if cultures were positive at the time of delivery. This practice recommendation was based on a small series of retrospectively gathered cases<sup>4</sup>and was generated without detailed knowledge of the natural history of genital or neonatal herpes (eg, differences between primary episode, nonprimary first episode, and recurrent episodes; and rates
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