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Volume 18, Number 10—October 2012
Etymologia

Etymologia: Tetanus

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Tetanus [tet′ə-nəs]

From the Greek tetanos (“tension,” from teinein, “to stretch”), an often fatal infectious disease caused by the anaerobic bacillus Clostridium tetani. Tetanus was well known to the ancients; Greek physician Aretaeus wrote in the first century ad, “Tetanus in all its varieties, is a spasm of an exceedingly painful nature, very swift to prove fatal, but neither easy to be removed.” Active immunization with tetanus toxoid was described in 1890, but cases continue to be reported (275 in the United States from 2001 through 2010), almost exclusively in persons who were never vaccinated or had not received a booster immunization in the previous 10 years. In developing countries, neonatal tetanus—when infants are infected through nonsterile delivery—is a major contributor to infant mortality. Worldwide, an estimated 59,000 infants died of neonatal tetanus in 2008.

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References

  1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Tetanus. In: Epidemiology and prevention of vaccine-preventable diseases. Atlanta: The Centers; 2012. p. 291–300.
  2. Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary. 32nd ed. Philadelphia: Elsevier Saunders; 2012.
  3. Pearce JM. Notes on tetanus (lockjaw).J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry. 1996;60:332. DOIPubMedGoogle Scholar
  4. Reddy P, Bleck TP. Clostridium tetani (tetanus). In: Mandell GL, Bennett JE, Dolin R, editors. Principles and practices of infectious diseases. 7th ed. Philadelphia: Churchill Livingstone; 2010. p. 3091–6.
  5. World Health Organization. Neonatal tetanus. October 4, 2011 [cited 2012 Aug 27]. http://www.who.int/immunization_monitoring/diseases/neonatal_tetanus/en/index.html

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Cite This Article

DOI: 10.3201/eid1810.et1810

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Table of Contents – Volume 18, Number 10—October 2012

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Page created: October 23, 2012
Page updated: October 23, 2012
Page reviewed: October 23, 2012
The conclusions, findings, and opinions expressed by authors contributing to this journal do not necessarily reflect the official position of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Public Health Service, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or the authors' affiliated institutions. Use of trade names is for identification only and does not imply endorsement by any of the groups named above.
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