Everything Is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection

The war was over at last, and Henry loved playing with friends in their Freetown neighborhood—in fact, he got his preschool uniform dirty so regularly that Isatu felt she was perpetually washing his clothes by hand, or else fetching the water for washing. Henry wore no mask—his bacterial load was low enough that he posed no infection risk to others. In Sierra Leone, being small and thin like Henry brought to mind not beauty but stunting and unwellness.[*2] In fact, Henry fit all the ideals of the consumptive—the wide eyes, the visible cheekbones, and the creative temperament. So many people couldn’t even access diagnostic tests, and when they finally made it to Lakka, their lungs were devastated.