Green and his wife visit Lakka Government Hospital, where a boy named Henry gives Green a tour of the facility.

A doctor reveals that Henry is a 17-year-old TB patient, not a staff member's child as Green had assumed.

Sierra Leone's history as a British colony left it without the infrastructure needed to develop its own healthcare system.

Henry and his mother Isatu are both diagnosed with TB and begin a standard regimen of four drugs.

Henry's father removes Henry from TB treatment in favor of faith healing, allowing the bacteria to develop drug resistance.

Isatu cannot raise enough money for Favor's larynx surgery in time, and Favor dies at age seven.

An Ebola outbreak collapses Sierra Leone's healthcare system and further stalls Henry's TB treatment.

Henry's drug-resistant TB strain is finally identified after years of misdiagnosis, and he is transferred to Lakka.

Robert Koch identifies M. tuberculosis under a microscope and proves that TB is transmitted through bacteria, not inherited.

Researchers combine streptomycin, isoniazid, pyrazinamide, ethambutol, and rifampin to form the RIPE protocol, the first drug regimen that cures TB.

Doctor Karel Styblo develops the DOTS strategy in Tanzania to provide cost-effective TB treatment in low-income countries.

Henry is treated with a toxic injectable drug regimen and loses hearing in one ear as a side effect.

Dr. Girum Tefera arrives as a new physician at Lakka and finds himself unable to effectively treat Henry's advanced case.

The nonprofit Partners in Health secures funding for Henry's experimental drug cocktail, and Dr. Girum begins the treatment.

Henry recovers from TB, returns home to Isatu, continues his education, and becomes an advocate for global healthcare.

Green visits Lakka Government Hospital and meets Henry, a teenage TB patient whose prolonged illness reflects decades of healthcare failure in Sierra Leone. Sierra Leone's colonial past as a British territory left it without adequate healthcare infrastructure, making Henry's early TB diagnosis and treatment especially difficult. Henry's treatment is repeatedly derailed — first by his father's turn to faith healing, then by his sister Favor's death, then by the Ebola outbreak — leaving him with a dangerous drug-resistant strain. Meanwhile, Green traces the scientific breakthroughs that produced TB's first cure, the RIPE protocol, and the DOTS strategy designed to deliver that cure to low-income countries like Sierra Leone. Despite these advances, cost barriers force Henry onto a toxic injectable regimen that leaves him partially deaf, while a new physician named Dr. Girum races to find an experimental alternative. Through nonprofit support, Henry's personalized treatment finally succeeds, and his recovery marks both a personal triumph and a blueprint for addressing the global TB crisis.

The headline story of TB healthcare's failures and Henry Reider's fight for survival.

James Watt builds a nitrous oxide machine to save his TB-stricken son Gregory from phthisis, but the machine fails and Gregory dies.

Green's great-uncle Strokes Goodrich contracts tuberculosis and dies in a North Carolina sanatorium at the age of 29.

John B. Stetson moves to the American West to treat his TB with dry air and invents the cowboy hat during his recovery.

Gavrilo Princip and his co-conspirators, all living with TB, assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand and help trigger World War I.

Civil war forces Isatu's family to flee to Freetown, where she meets Henry's father and becomes pregnant with Henry.

The Persian scholar Ibn Sina becomes the first to propose that TB might be caused by foreign organisms in the body.

During the 18th and 19th centuries, TB is widely romanticized as a disease of beauty, sensitivity, and creative genius.

Western writers label TB a civilized disease and deny that it afflicts colonized or non-white populations.

Sanatorium patient Gale Perkins watches her closest friend Angie be carried to the morgue after dying of TB.

Transgender doctor Alan Hart pioneers the use of chest X-rays to detect TB across communities in the United States.

Researchers develop the BCG vaccine from bovine TB samples, creating the only vaccine that reduces TB severity in children.

The HIV/AIDS epidemic causes a surge of TB deaths across the Global South while international investment focuses on HIV alone.

Partners in Health begins treating drug-resistant TB patients in Lima, Peru, and cures the majority of them.

Phumeza Tisile protests Johnson and Johnson's attempt to extend their bedaquiline patent in India and wins the campaign.

Henry launches a YouTube channel to document his life, raise funds for community causes, and advocate for TB awareness.

Green anchors the history of TB in personal stories, from his great-uncle Strokes Goodrich dying in a sanatorium to John B. Stetson inventing the cowboy hat after fleeing TB to the American West. The disease's long reach also shaped political history, as TB-infected conspirators assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand and helped trigger World War I. Green traces how cultures distorted TB through romanticization and racial denial, labeling it a civilized disease to exclude colonized populations from both its narrative and its healthcare. Scientific progress brought the chest X-ray and the BCG vaccine, but the sanatorium era showed how treatment could be weaponized as control, as witnessed by young patient Gale Perkins when her best friend Angie died there. The HIV/AIDS crisis compounded TB deaths across the Global South while wealthy nations concentrated resources elsewhere, and it took activists like Phumeza Tisile to fight corporate patent monopolies and make life-saving drugs more accessible. Henry's eventual recovery becomes its own form of advocacy, as his YouTube channel spreads awareness and builds the virtuous cycles Green argues can end TB.

The historical figures, social forces, and wider stories behind the TB crisis.

Green opens the book by declaring that TB is still the world's deadliest infectious disease despite cures existing for decades.

Green's guide makes an unplanned detour to Lakka Hospital, forcing Green to confront that TB is an urgent present-day crisis.

Henry's early TB tests using microscopy return negative, delaying his diagnosis despite his visibly worsening symptoms.

Henry resumes standard TB treatment after faith healing fails, but his bacteria have already developed an undetected drug-resistant strain.

As wealthier classes leave crowded industrial cities, TB shifts from a romanticized disease of the creative elite to a stigmatized disease of the poor.

After Koch's discovery, American medical institutions use racialized science to falsely claim that Black communities are inherently more susceptible to TB.

Arthur Conan Doyle discovers that Koch misidentified a strong immune response as a TB cure, and Koch is publicly disgraced.

Sanatorium patient Gale Perkins receives streptomycin treatment and becomes one of the first patients to recover from active TB.

Despite the development of the RIPE protocol, effective TB drug treatments remain financially inaccessible to formerly colonized nations.

Shreya Tripathi wins her court case forcing bedaquiline access in India but dies of TB before her lungs can recover.

Green learns that Shreya Tripathi was a devoted reader of his fiction, transforming his understanding of TB into a personal mission.

Henry's injectable treatment fails and Dr. Girum consults international colleagues to design a personalized experimental drug regimen.

Henry's closest friend at Lakka, Thompson, dies unexpectedly, causing Henry to lose hope and stop eating.

Henry's father threatens Dr. Girum with violence, but Dr. Girum persuades him to allow one final treatment attempt for Henry's sake.

Henry's sputum tests clear of bacteria, his father apologizes to Dr. Girum, and Henry returns home to Isatu.

Green opens with the stark declaration that TB kills more people than any other infectious disease despite cures existing for decades, and his unplanned detour to Lakka Hospital transforms that statistic into a human reality embodied by Henry. Henry's story turns on a series of near-misses — his symptoms go undetected by flawed microscopy tests, and his father's choice to pursue faith healing allows a drug-resistant strain to develop silently. Scientific history offers its own turning points, from Koch's misidentified vaccine being exposed by Arthur Conan Doyle to Gale Perkins becoming one of the first patients cured by streptomycin. The discovery of TB cures brings no relief for colonized nations, a point made devastatingly personal through Shreya Tripathi, whose court victory for drug access comes too late to save her own lungs. At Lakka, Henry's crisis deepens when his injectables fail and his best friend Thompson dies, leaving Henry without hope until Dr. Girum's appeal to his father and Henry's own decision to stay change the course of his treatment. Henry's recovery and his father's apology bring both personal and systemic healing, showing how individual turning points can set off virtuous cycles that extend far beyond one life.

The pivotal moments of discovery, decision, and emotional reckoning that drive the story.