From Sanatorium to Domicile treatment.

On the occasion of World TB day.

Part-3

Once upon a time, Plague used to kill one third of population.

People also believed that the bubo of plague could only be repealed by the smell of filth.

In fact, the popular conception in those days was that bathing increased susceptibility to disease. They thought warm water expanded the pores, thereby letting the plague enter the body more easily.

So in plague time, People generally BATHED only TWICE a YEAR and they changed their clothes even less often. This led further to poorer hyigene and more rapid spread of the neimesis.

When french physician Nostradamus advised regular bathing and maintain hyiegene people didn’t follow him.

It was Robert Koch’s land mark announcement on 24 March, 1882 ended the then Miasma theory and put paid to the proliferation of the Sanatorium culture.

On this day in 1882, in a small auditorium of University of Berlin’s Institute of Hygiene, Robert Koch announced to the public that TB is caused not by bad air but by a mere microbe.

So 24 march is the BIRTHDAY of TB bacilli not Robert Koch.

This momentuos declaration not only defeated the killer TB bacilli, but also prolonged the life expectancy of humankind as a whole.

It inspired a whole lot of illustrious doctor scientists like Pasteur, Loeffler, Yersin who led the mankind’s fight against all infectious diseases.

Healthy competition between Pasteur’s Lab in Paris and Koch’s Lab in Berlin led to many landmark discoveries like causative organisms of Anthrax, TB, Cholera, Plague, Tetanus etc.

It also brought in the era of Antitoxins against Diphtheria, Tetanus; Vaccines against Rabies and above all Pasteurisation of milk.
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On this World TB day, we gratefully remember the contribution of the captain of them all “Herr Doctor Professor Robert Koch”.