 Today in my Microbiology class, we were talking about enteric diseases. These are the type of diseases that screw up goings-on in your gastrointestinal tract so you're subjected to wonderful symptoms such as vomiting and diarrhea. For some reason, I'm glad I'm not going to be a GI specialist. Anyway, I think one of my favorite disease to learn about is Typhoid. Not because I want to suffer the illness (in Neuro a few days ago we had a lecture about pain and the professor decided to go off on a tangent about how pain is a universally uncomfortable feeling but there are people out there that enjoy pain), but because I think it has a pretty interesting history.
I took two Microbiology classes in college, one of them was in my senior year and it was a Food Microbiology class. In my freshman year, I took Natural History of Infectious Diseases, which was an awesome class. This is where I first learned about Typhoid. One of the most frustrating things about the disease is that some people can actually have the pathogenic bacteria (Salmonella typhi) in their body but not develop any signs of the disease. These people are what are known as "carriers". The method of transmission of the bacteria is mostly related to food preparation but also can be in the water in areas that have bad sanitation problems. Therefore, a carrier can infect numerous people just by preparing their food and wouldn't even know about it.
In the early 20th century, the most notorious of Typhoid carriers was identified. Her name was Mary Mallon and since has been affectionately nicknamed "Typhoid Mary". She was a cook for a family and was closely related to many incidences, but suspected of unknowingly infecting hundreds of people that she had prepared food for. Since she was a major threat to other people's well-being, the authorities told her that she either had to have surgery to remove her gall bladder or stop cooking. Surgery in those days had the tendency to leave the patient with more problems than they went in with, so Mary chose to quit the cooking job.
Cooking was Mary's thing, and so she couldn't find anything else to make a living from, so she did the unbelievable. She changed her name and got a new cooking job. Once this was discovered, the authorities were not too happy and sent Mary to jail. The best part of this story is more legend than fact since there's really no way to prove it, but I was told in my freshman year Infectious Diseases class that before the prison administration had found out the relevance of who she was, they assigned her to work in the kitchen area of the prison. Shortly thereafter, this was discovered. Mary then spent 26 years in quarantine and died in 1938 at the age of 69...not due to typhoid but to pneumonia.
Listening To: Franz Ferdinand - Walk Away
I cannot turn to see those eyes
As apologies may rise
I must be strong and stay an unbeliever
And love the sound of you walking away.
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