TB or not TB

Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria that cause tuberculosis (TB), live in approximately one in three people worldwide. The bacteria can lie latent inside the body for decades until it becomes active in 10% of infected people. Active TB kills one person every 20 seconds.


Efforts to control the spread of TB received a much-needed boost last Tuesday when Sydney's Centenary Institute opened a new $1.2 million high biosecurity lab for tuberculosis research.

The new laboratory is fitted with airlocks and researchers must wear full biocontainment suits when handling and culturing the deadly bacteria.

Read more about the new laboratory and about tuberculosis in my recent article here

New job, new material

As part of my new job as an education officer at the Museum of Human Disease at the University of New South Wales, I'll be writing about current research and news about health and disease.

These articles will be posted on the Museum's website and are intended for a general audience as well as a resource for teachers and high school students.

The first article discusses two recent cases of typhoid at the Christmas Island detention centre. While the risk of the disease spreading was very small, these cases caused panic within the detention centre and in the residential areas of the island.



Interesting fact: People can carry and spread the bacteria (Salmonella typhi) that causes typhoid without displaying symptoms. One of the most notorious asymptomatic carriers of typhoid was Mary Mallon, known as Typhoid Mary.

During her career as a cook in the United States between 1900 and 1915, Mary is thought to have infected 53 people, three of whom died of the disease. She spent the last 23 years of her life quarantined in isolation to prevent her from spreading the disease to others.