TB or not TB?

March 24th

After having been moved from one ward to another isolation ward, I was told that I was to moved back again to Weston ward; a non isolation ward. Apparently now I was TB negative. In other words they had cultured three TB negative spewtum samples, so I was no longer an infection risk. Great, at least I don't have to keep looking at people with masks on all the time.

I was also informed that infact I didn't have TB. I had TB avium, which is an 'environmental' TB, meaning that it can not be spead from person to person. Instead it is caught from the environment by people with weak immune systems - ie like me. I must have caught it somewhere from a ditry place, and it may have been lingering in my system for some time. It's not possible to tell how long I'd been harbouring the disease.

It may not be contagious and there may not be some many drugs to take to sort out the infection, but I'm looking at twice the time - 18 to 24 months for the total course of medication....