Q 01/05

The bacterium that causes TB belongs to which genus?

A) Streptococcus

B) Staphylococcus

C) Clostridium

D) Mycobacterium

Answer · why

D) Mycobacterium

Mycobacterium. The genus wears a thick, waxy coat that shrugs off the standard lab stain and helps it survive drying out, weak disinfectants and the b...

Q 02/05

By what name was tuberculosis most commonly known in nineteenth-century English?

A) The ague

B) Apoplexy

C) Dropsy

D) Consumption

Answer · why

D) Consumption

Consumption. The word had meant a wasting illness since the 1300s, and it fitted the way patients grew thinner and weaker, as if the disease were usin...

Q 03/05

How does tuberculosis usually spread?

A) Through the air when an infected person coughs

B) Through contaminated drinking water

C) By the bite of an infected mosquito

D) By touching shared surfaces and door handles

Answer · why

A) Through the air when an infected person coughs

It travels through the air when an infected person coughs, sneezes, talks or sings. Catching it usually takes long hours of shared indoor air, so most...

Q 04/05

Which literary family lost at least five of its six children to tuberculosis?

A) The Austens

B) The Shelleys

C) The Brontës

D) The Rossettis

Answer · why

C) The Brontës

The Brontës. Maria and Elizabeth died as schoolgirls in 1825, and Branwell, Emily and Anne followed within nine months of one another in 1848-49, leav...

Q 05/05

Who identified the bacillus that causes tuberculosis in 1882?

A) Louis Pasteur

B) Robert Koch

C) Joseph Lister

D) Paul Ehrlich

Answer · why

B) Robert Koch

Robert Koch. The germ is so hard to stain and so slow to grow that he had to devise new methods for both before he could show it to fellow doctors und...