Richard Riley’s avatar

Richard Riley

Historical profile
American physician

Chronicled events

  1. #5786

    Germs cause infectious diseases, and they pass from one person to the next by touch, in water or food, and through the air, on droplets so small that they float. Tuberculosis spreads that way.

    #5788

    Guinea pigs breathing air from a tuberculosis ward caught the disease. With ultraviolet light killing the germs in the same air, they didn’t. It’s the germs in the air that spread disease, not the air itself.