Last week, a Brandeis University student was diagnosed with an active case of tuberculosis, causing at least 250 students, staff and faculty to be interviewed, and if necessary, tested for the illness. No other members of the community tested positive for the active disease as of Monday afternoon.

In an email announcing the health concern on Thursday, Senior Vice President for Students and Enrollment Andrew Flagel said the student has been isolated and is responding to treatment.

"At this point there is no reason to believe that this issue will impact the day-to-day operations of the university," said Flagel.

University officials paid special attention to several students who had close ties to the student with TB, according to Bill Burger, associate vice president for communications.

Burger declined to provide the location or any additional details about the student with TB, citing privacy concerns.

Noone has tested postive for the disease, according to Diana Denning, the nurse manager at the health center.

University health workers have been in close contact with state public health officials, who have commended the University for its response, according to Denning.

In an interview with the Justice, Denning said that "the school was very proactive and immediately started thinking about the best way to inform [the community]. They made a choice to broadly inform the entire community."

"The more information people have, the more we could help support their concerns. I feel like things were handled pretty well," she continued.

TB is a bacterial infectious disease that usually affects the lungs but can spread to other parts of the body, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention website. A person with the active disease can spread TB through the air.

Not everyone with TB becomes sick and the bacteria can live in an individual's body without showing symptoms, according to the CDC.

Fourty percent of the world carries this form of the disease, called "latent tuberculosis." A person with latent TB cannot spread the bacteria to others. TB cannot be spread through shaking hands, sharing food or drink, touching bed linens or toilet seats, sharing toothbrushes or kissing, according to the CDC. Symptoms of active TB disease include a bad cough that lasts three weeks or longer, pain in the chest, coughing up blood or sputum, weakness or fatigue, weight loss, no appetite, chills, fever and sweating at night.

According to Denning, the health center screens all incoming students for TB at matriculation, which is helpful in the case of an active diagnosis such as the one last week.

-Sam Mintz contributed reporting.