Tuberculosis
History of TB
Tuberculosis has been with people since antiquity.
Theories suggest that it could have spread to early people through domesticated cattle
Prehistoric humans as rarly has 4000 BCE had TB.
TB has been found in the remains of Egyptian mummies 3000-2400 BCE.
Phthisis is a Greek term for tuberculosis, and around 460 BCE, Hypocrites phthisis as the most widespread disease of the times.
Prior to the age of reason, tuberculosis may sometimes have been regarded as a sign of vampirism. When one member of a family died from it, the other members that were infected would lose their health slowly. People believed that this was caused by the original victim draining the life from the other family members.
Starting in 1679 scientists started to understand the nature of TB
English physician Benjamin Marten was the first to conjecture in 1720 that microanimals were the cause of TB
By the mid 1800s the sanatorium cure was the treatment of choice
In 1882 Robert Koch was the first to see Mycobacterium tuberculosis.
In 1895 the discovery of x-rays by Wilhelm Konrad von Rontgen advanced diagnosis of TB
Next Etiology
Return Start