Everything is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of our Deadliest Infection – John Green

Thoughts: Everything is Tuberculosis tells a story that is fascinating and frustrating and disappointing and hopeful, in turns and all at once. A combination of history and facts and stories, all thoughtfully woven together. I can’t exactly say I enjoyed it, but it’s engaging throughout.

(The notes below are not a summary of the book, but rather raw notes - whatever I thought, at the time, might be worth remembering.)

Green, John. 2025. Everything is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of our Deadliest Infection. Crash Course Books.

• 112: Humanity has a single tuberculosis vaccine. It was first made available in 1921, and it’s based on a strain of bovine tuberculosis. It’s pretty effective at preventing severe illness in children, and not very effective at preventing infection/illness in adults.
• 90-93: Robert Koch invented “Koch’s serum”, or tuberculin, a substance “derived from the tuberculosis bacterium”. Koch claimed this serum could cure people of tuberculosis, a claim which ultimately caused him to be discredited.
  • 94: It was Arthur Conan Doyle who, investigating Koch’s claims, discovered that while tuberculin evokes an immune response in people infected with tuberculosis, it has no curative or preventative effects. Tuberculin was still useful, however, since it allowed people whose tuberculosis infections were not active to be identified.
• 141: “A 2024 study commissioned by the WHO found that every dollar spent on tuberculosis care generates around thirty-nine dollars in benefit by reducing the number (and expense) of future TB cases, and through more people being able to work rather than being chronically ill or caring for their chronically ill loved ones.” j: wow!