The ability to oxidize sparteine to form 2- and 5-dehydrosparteine was studied in 154 healthy Ghanaians. Although the urinary metabolic sparteine/dehydrosparteines ratio varied widely (from 0.14 to 12.5), in contrast to observations in several Caucasian population groups the ratios were not bimodally distributed and no phenotypically poor oxidizers of sparteine were found. The ability of these same subjects to oxidize debrisoquin and phenformin was also studied in 141 and 143 subjects. Of the 141 subjects dosed with debrisoquin, 10 proved to be poor oxidizers, and of the 143 subjects dosed with phenformin, 11 were poor oxidizers. All the poor oxidizers of debrisoquin were also poor oxidizers of phenformin. The 10 confirmed poor metabolizers of debrisoquin, who had debrisoquin metabolic ratios ranging from 14.4 to 52.0, had sparteine metabolic ratios ranging only from 0.15 to 12.5. Whereas Caucasian poor metabolizers of sparteine excrete less than 2.0% of a dose as dehydrosparteines, the mean excretion of dehydrosparteines in our 10 subjects was 20.6% +/- 13.2%. The overall rank correlation between the sparteine and debrisoquin metabolic ratios was low (rs = 0.47), while the coefficient of determination for linear regression (r2) was only 0.17. Our data show that the ability of Ghanaians to oxidize sparteine is largely independent of their capacity for debrisoquin oxidation and is indicative of a major interethnic difference in the genetic control of these reactions.