 |
The advent and
adoption of the germ theory of infectious diseases changed the intellectual
landscape for medicine and launched modern medicine as we know it today.
Theories about microbial causation had been around for centuries and
actively pursued for decades in the 19th century. Louis Pasteur
supported this theory in the 1860s, and it was Joseph Lister’s belief in
Pasteur’s theories that led Lister to adopt antiseptic practices in surgery.
In 1876, Pasteur and German physician Robert Koch independently demonstrated
that one microorganism, Bacillus anthracis, caused one disease,
anthrax, in sheep. They identified the anthrax bacillus first because of its
large size, approximately 5 microns, which could be seen under microscopes
without the benefit of stains, which developed soon after.
|
