Mycobacterium ulcerans and Buruli ulcer
Mycobacterium ulcerans y la úlcera de Buruli
- Date
- 1948 · confidence high
- Place
- Bairnsdale, Victoria, Australia
- Credited to
- Peter MacCallum, J. C. Tolhurst, G. Buckle and H. A. Sissons
- Field
- Life & health
What was discovered
Melbourne doctors isolated a new mycobacterium from six patients with skin ulcers from the Bairnsdale area. It is the third most common mycobacterial disease in healthy people, after tuberculosis and leprosy.
The disease was described earlier in Uganda (1897, Albert Cook), but the agent was isolated and recognised as new in Australia in 1948.
What it led to
- recognition of the disease in Africa (Buruli, Uganda) and in 30 countries
- studies of the toxin mycolactone
- combined antibiotic treatment