Word: germ
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Streptomycin, an antibiotic containing a germ-killing soil organism called Actinomyces griseus, is especially effective against certain deadly "gram-negative" infections for which there was no known cure. It does the job in many a case where penicillin and the sulfa drugs fail. But it is expensive: about $16 a gram (average treatment: six to ten grams). Since the drug's discovery in 1944 by Rutgers' Microbiologist Selman A. Waksman, it has been tested against a wide variety of diseases by a National Research Council committee headed by Boston's Dr. Chester S. Keefer. Their report...
Early in the war U.S. authorities suspected that the enemy might be assembling task forces of death-dealing microorganisms. Against this possibility, however remote, defensive measures were needed. Since no one knew how the germ attack might be launched, the only thing to do was to study all the possible offensive methods and develop defenses against them...
...Germ Clouds. Of particular interest were "airborne disease-producing agents," which need no insects or drinking water to carry them to their victims. The scientists developed "precise methods" of producing "clouds" of such microorganisms...
Some doctors endorse Dr. Kabat's treatment; others admit he "has the germ of a good idea," but cautiously withhold full approval. Says Dr. Kabat: "I feel the results speak for themselves...
...refer to our work on the growth of the tubercle bacillus as "the greatest contribution to TB research since Robert Koch first isolated the germ itself in 1882" is, to say the least, a gross exaggeration. There have been many great achievements in the field of tuberculosis since the time of Koch. Thus, the therapeutic possibilities of sulfones and streptomycin, as well as the studies of immunization with BCG, are discussed in the very same issue of your magazine; you could also have mentioned, among other lines of progress, the improvement of X-ray methods of diagnosis, the campaign...