bacillus

While waiting or serving his sentence, he’d probably get infected with TB—it was estimated that 80 percent of all Russian prisoners had bacilli in their bodies.

Swabs from the skin, nose and mouth, as well as saliva and stool samples, showed that 34 percent of all participants had antibiotic-resistant bacteria, such as resistant Gram-negative bacilli or vancomycin-resistant enterococci.

Scientists postulate that the bacillus originated in some lower animal and jumped to humans.

But tuberculosis is also curable and preventable, caused by a bacillus, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, and spread when people who are sick expel bacteria into the air, usually by coughing.

Koch complied with a vial swarming with cholera bacilli.