Book excerpt: Excerpt from Leprosy In 1874, Dr. Hansen reported to the Medical Society of Christiania that 'he had often, indeed generally, found when seeking for them in the leprous tubercles, small rod-shaped bodies in the cells of the swellings.' This was the first announcement of the discovery of the bacillus of leprosy, which in less than ten years from that date had been found to be invariably present in leprous tissues in all countries where the disease occurs. The discovery of a specific organism naturally raised afresh the question as to the contagiousness of the malady with which it is associated; leprosy, which had at one time been treated as a most contagious disease, having come to be considered in modern times, by many medical men, as not contagious at all. With the recognition of this special organism, the supposition that leprosy might be contagious was naturally strengthened; but although of late years the belief in its communicability has been steadily growing stronger, we are yet far from having attained unanimity on the point. One of the chief objects of this book is to systematise, for the convenience of the medical profession, the knowledge that has been acquired up to the present time relating to the bacillus leprae, its relations to the pathological changes peculiar to leprosy, and its important bearings on the etiology of the disease. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."