Tuberculosis has been entwined with humanity for millennia. Once romanticized as a malady of poets, today tuberculosis is a disease of poverty that walks the trails of injustice and inequity we blazed for it.

In 2019, John Green met Henry, a young tuberculosis patient at Lakka Government Hospital in Sierra Leone while traveling with Partners in Health. John became fast friends with Henry — a boy with spindly legs and a big, goofy smile.

Since that first visit, Green has become a powerful advocate for increased access to treatment and greater awareness of the healthcare inequities that allow this curable, treatable infectious disease to remain the deadliest infectious disease in the world, killing 1.5 million people each year.

In Everything Is Tuberculosis, Henry’s story is woven together with the scientific and social history of tuberculosis — and the choices that will shape its future.