World Tuberculosis Day is celebrated this Friday (3/24). The date, created by World Health Organization (WHO) in 1982, it appeared as a tribute to the 100th anniversary of the announcement of the discovery of the bacillus that causes the disease, which took place on March 24, 1882, by physician Robert Koch.
According to the WHO, one third of the world’s population is infected by Mycobacterium tuberculosis. In addition, there are about 8.8 million patients and 1 million deaths per year in the world.
Each patient with untreated pulmonary tuberculosis can infect an average of ten to 15 people a year, according to the Ministry of Health. Some factors contribute to the spread of the disease, such as poverty and poor income distribution, AIDS, malnutrition, poor sanitary conditions and high population density.
Tuberculosis symptoms
The most common symptoms and signs of tuberculosis are:
- Dry cough or secretion for more than three weeks, which may progress to coughing up pus or blood;
- Excessive tiredness and prostration;
- Low fever usually in the afternoon;
- night sweat;
- Lack of appetite;
- Accentuated weight loss and
- Hoarseness.
Some patients show no signs of the disease, while others have seemingly simple symptoms that go unnoticed for months. It can be confused with the flu, for example, and evolve over three to four months without the infected person knowing it, at the same time transmitting the disease to other people.
To read more, visit the portal health by day, partner of metropolises.
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