What is Anthrax disease? Can it be transmitted to humans? All you need to know

After a deer on the IIT Madras campus was reported dead due to anthrax, it has alarmed human beings about the possibility of this zoonotic disease infection that’s caused by bacteria. According to the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), human beings can get sick with anthrax infections if they come in contact with infected animals or contaminated animal products. 

Here are more details about Anthrax infections, symptoms, and preventive measures.

What is Anthrax?

Anthrax is an infectious disease caused by Bacillus anthracis which is a gram-positive, rod-shaped bacteria. The bacteria is found naturally in soil and is commonly known to affect domestic and wild animals across the world.

Though there is no evidence of anthrax transmitting from person to person, it can infect man when anthrax spores get into the body. These spores get activated after getting inside the body. The bacteria then multiply and spread inside the body, producing toxins, resulting in severe illness. Spores tend to enter a man's body when a person breathes in spores, eats food or drinks water contaminated with spores, or gets spores in a cut or wound in the skin.

The infectious disease is rare and is most common in agricultural regions of Central and South America, sub-Saharan Africa, central and southwestern Asia, southern and eastern Europe, and the Caribbean.

Anthrax Symptoms

Anthrax can cause severe illness in both humans and animals that vary based on four common routes of anthrax infection. In several cases, symptoms develop within six days of exposure to the bacteria. While in the case of inhalation of anthrax spores, symptoms take more than six weeks to appear.

Some of the common symptoms include Fever, chills, swelling in the neck or glands, nausea, loss of appetite, vomiting, and diarrhea, which may be bloody, headache, stomachache, redness in your eyes and face, pain, and swelling in the abdomen. 

There was a report of anthrax used for nonanimal transmission as a bioterrorism attack that occurred in the United States in 2001. Twenty-two people developed the infection after being exposed to spores sent via the mail, of which five died.

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