Tuberculosis is a contagious disease. Only people who are sick with active pulmonary tuberculosis are infectious. When infectious people cough, sneeze, talk or spit, they propel tuberculosis germs, known as bacilli, into the air. A person needs to inhale only a small number of bacilli to be infected. The most common symptoms of active pulmonary tuberculosis are a persistent cough that does not go away, unexplained weight loss, low-grade fever, night chills, coughing up blood, and loss of appetite.
Tuberculosis is treated with a course of antibiotics, usually taken for many months.
If a tuberculosis patient stops the medication early or misses many doses of medicine, the tuberculosis may return and develop a resistance to certain drugs. The disease then becomes more difficult to treat. Department of Public Health and Social Services and tuberculosis.net. All rights reserved.