The basic treatment today is much the same as in von Behring's day. The patient with suspected diphtheria is isolated and dosed with horse antitoxin. Speed is vital, as the antitoxin is only effective on free toxin molecules - it can't neutralise those already bound to a cell. A course of powerful antibiotics kills off the C. diphtheriae bacteria. Doctors then have to track down anybody who might have been in close proximity with the patient.
Diphtheria is very expensive to treat.
Added to this is the cost of tracking down contacts and dosing them with antibiotics. The disease has already begun to leak out into neighbouring countries. Finland hadn't recorded any cases of diphtheria for 30 years, but it reported four in 1994. In Germany, six new arrivals from Russia in 1994 were infected. Poland reported ten cases in 1993.