Govt. well-prepared to combat Anthrax: Minister

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE, OCT. 24. The Minister for Health and Family Welfare, Dr. A.B. Maalakaraddy, has said that drugs worth Rs. 1 crore have been stocked in the various government hospitals in the State to deal with cases of anthrax.

Addressing presspersons on Wednesday, he said that the Government was well prepared to prevent any occurrence of the disease, and there was no need for the people to become panicky. The minister, who is himself a professor of medicine, said that anthrax was not a contagious disease, and there was no need for taking antibiotics for its prevention.

The minister thus advised against mass inoculation as was done in 1994 when a few cases of plague were detected in the State as an aftermath of the large-scale outbreak in Surat (Gujarat). Dr. Maalakaraddy was the minister holding the same portfolio even then. He noted that vaccination of human beings against anthrax was not in vogue in the country. The disease was under control among animals, he said.

He and the Director of Health and Family Welfare, Dr. G.V. Nagaraj, said that the easily available penicillin was very effective in treating anthrax. However, Cefotaxime and Ceprofloxacin were also effective in its treatment. Those drugs were freely available in government hospitals. Besides the antibiotics in the form of injections and tablets, intravenous fluids had been stocked in the hospitals and the doctors instructed about the treatment regimes.

Guidelines had also been issued to them regarding treatment of suspected cases which could be in the form of flu (viral disease), acute onset ulcer, acute gastroenteritis with bloody diarrhoea or meningitis.

One case reported: Mr. Nagaraj said that so far, only one case of suspected anthrax had been reported in the State. A man hailing from the Sidlaghatta taluk of Kolar District was treated at a private hospital in Kolar in the first week of September (before the terrorist attacks in the U.S. took place).

Dr. Nagaraj said that a member of the public had, a few days ago, handed over to one of the units of his department in the City an envelope containing a powder. It had been sent for examination to find out if it contained substances capable of spreading contagious diseases.

However, Dr. Maalakaraddy said that animal anthrax was prevalent in parts of the State such as Kolar, Mysore, Bangalore Rural, Tumkur, Bellary, Dharwad, and Bidar districts which had a high population of sheep and cattle. Its occurrence among human beings was being reported before 1954. People could contract anthrax through contact with infected animals, wool, meat or hides. In its common form, it was a skin disease which caused skin ulcers, fever, and fatigue. Up to 20 per cent of the cases could prove fatal if they were not treated. There were three types of anthrax -- cutaneous, transmitted through handling of animals; inhalation anthrax, which was an airborne infection; and, gastro intestinal anthrax, caused by the consumption of half-cooked meat or raw meat, or drinking infected water.

The minister has requested those receiving suspicious mail to hand it over to the jurisdictional medical officer or the police. They could also contact the Joint Director (Communicable Diseases), Directorate of Health and Family Welfare Services, Ananda Row Circle, Bangalore 560 009 (phone: 2871950), Dr. Shyamal Biswas, Officer in Charge, National Institute of Communicable Disease, National Tuberculosis Institute campus, Bellary Road (near Palace Guttahalli), Bangalore 560 003, or the Professor and Head of the Department of Microbiology, Victoria Hospital, Bangalore.

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Section  : Southern States
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