Dr. Kiyoshi Shiga: discoverer of the dysentery bacillus

Abstract

The clinical manifestations of dysentery have been described for centuries, and the prototypic bacterial agent, Shigella dysenteriae, was identified 100 years ago. In the English language there has been remarkably little written about Dr. Kiyoshi Shiga, discoverer of the dysentery bacillus. We submit a brief biography of Dr. Shiga and the circumstances leading to his discovery, which proved the bacterial etiology of nonamebic dysentery.