A: The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) gradually incapacitates the immune system, predisposing the individual to many microbes, including the
tubercle bacillus. AIDS patients are especially vulnerable to TB.
It has been shown that cockroaches can carry other pathogenic species such as: Salmonella sp.,
tubercle bacillus, Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella sp., Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Streptococcus sp., Shigella sp.
Approximately 1% of the estimated 10 million persons in the United States who are infected with the
tubercle bacillus (CDC, unpublished data) were identified and treated in 1988.
According to Dixie Snider, chief of the CDC's Division of Tuberculosis Control, one of the major roadblocks to controlling the disease is that the TB-causing
tubercle bacillus resides undetected in large numbers of people.
Granulomatous responses can be caused by several factors, the most common in India being the
tubercle bacillus. The histological feature in these disorders may be quite typical so as to be diagnosed by an experienced pathologist, but in cases where atypical presentation is seen, help of other ancillary tests on special stains may be required.
[3] Various reasons are given for the low incidence of gall bladder tuberculosis--including failure to recognize the condition or a special resistance of the gall bladder to the
tubercle bacillus. [5] it is not clearly known whether the infection can occur in a normal gall bladder.
German researcher Friedrich Freidmann reported isolation of this pathogen from the lung tissues of sea turtles (Chelona corticata) in 1903, referring to it as the turtle
tubercle bacillus. In 1920, the Society of American Bacteriologists recommended that the organism be named after its discoverer, or Mycobacterium friedmannii.
When Koch had announced the discovery of the
tubercle bacillus in 1882, Ehrlich lost no time in developing an effective stain to demonstrate the
tubercle bacillus and established its acid fastness.
In a normal host, the immunologic response to infection with the
tubercle bacillus provides some protection against additional bacilli that may subsequently be inhaled in droplet nuclei.
So entrenched was the belief in the miasmatic origins of disease that it survived the announcements of Pasteur's germ theory -- that linked diseases to specific pathogens -- in 1864, and Robert Koch's isolation of the anthrax bacillus in 1876 and the
tubercle bacillus in 1882.
(5) In PAP stained smears the slightly curved, beaded
tubercle bacillus may be readily identified.
Sadly still a global threat, particularly among AIDS patients and the underprivileged, tuberculosis remains as debilitating and traumatizing as in Munch's experience and art, even though the
tubercle bacillus as its etiologic agent was discovered during his lifetime.