Aretaeus of Cappadocia on Leprosy's Transmission
Abstract
Leprosy has been the scourge of humanity since antiquity. In 1874, the Norwegian microbiologist Gerhard Armauer Hansen isolated Mycobacterium leprae, showing that it was a transmissible infection and not an inherited one, as it was believed for centuries. It should be noted that in the first century AD, Aretaeus of Cappadocia, a Greek-born physician who studied medicine in Alexandria and practiced in Rome, provided not only the earliest and best description of leprosy (leonine appearance,...