Tales of Tb

Though all but forgotten in affluent regions, tuberculosis is an ancient pandemic that still kills 1.5 million people every year. Rampant in England during the 1800s, it was accepted that 1% of the population would succumb each year to the wasting disease--consumption. A grim reaper that would one day be known as tuberculosis, or more dramatically, "The White Plague." Although it was most often a disease of poverty, no one was safe from the White Plague. Seven well-known people of a not-so-distant past left detailed accounts of their tuberculous lives across letters, essays, poems, and biographies. Their surnames are Barrett-Moulton, Keats, Bronte, Poe, Browning, Trudeau, and Stevenson. The stories of these talented writers and poets, along with documentation from their doctors, are explored here, portraying the variations of the disease and the personalities of its victims. Beginning with the subject in the well-loved painting "Pinkie" by Thomas Lawrence in 1794 (known through Robert Louis Stevenson of Treasure Island fame), the book moves into the sanatorium era of the late 1800s and first half of the 20th century. In 1950, medical science came up with several semi-miraculous medications that amazingly cured the worst types of tuberculosis. However, the White Plague has soldiered on, and there have been unexpected happenings that play a role in maintaining mortality: the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), drug resistant tuberculosis, and the Covid-19 pandemic, which has severely damaged tuberculosis control and reduced access to medication in the less privileged regions of the world. Will tuberculosis always be with us as a "forever" pandemic?