Tuberculosis is a systemic infectious disease caused by a specific micro-organism. It most often involves the lung and is usually bilateral, but, fortunately, the major disease area is predominantly unilateral and often unilobar. Prevention of infection or establishment of acquired resistance1 would be the ideal treatment. Progress is being made in both of these methods.
Since prophylactic treatment is not entirely effective, early recognition of the disease is important. Great advances are being made in this direction by means of roentgenographic examinations of large groups of people.2 Perhaps in the not too distant future every patient admitted to a hospital will have a roentgenogram made of the chest, just as he now has a urinalysis and a serologic test for syphilis.
Chemotherapy would be the ideal method of treatment of the disease. Various chemical agents are being studied diligently for the arrest of pulmonary tuberculosis, but as yet