Anthrax spores can and have been used as a biological warfare weapon. Its first modern incidence occurred when Scandinavian rebels, supplied by the German General Staff, used anthrax with unknown results against the Imperial Russian Army in Finland in 1916.[58]Anthrax was first tested as a biological warfare agent by Unit 731 of the Japanese Kwantung Army in Manchuria during the 1930s; some of this testing involved intentional infection of prisoners of war, thousands of whom died. Anthrax, designated at the time as Agent N, was also investigated by the Allies in the 1940s.
A long history of practical bioweapons research exists in this area. For example, in 1942, British bioweapons trials[59] severely contaminated Gruinard Island in Scotland with anthrax spores of the Vollum-14578 strain, making it a no-go area until it was decontaminated in 1990.[60][61] The Gruinard trials involved testing the effectiveness of a submunition of an "N-bomb" — a biological weapon containing dried anthrax spores. Additionally, five million "cattle cakes" (animal feed pellets impregnated with anthrax spores) were prepared and stored at Porton Down for "Operation Vegetarian" — antilivestock attacks against Germany to be made by the Royal Air Force.[62] The plan was for anthrax-based biological weapons to be dropped on Germany in 1944. However, the edible cattle cakes and the bomb were not used; the cattle cakes were incinerated in late 1945.
Weaponized anthrax was part of the US stockpile prior to 1972, when the United States signed the Biological Weapons Convention.[63] President Nixon ordered the dismantling of US biowarfare programs in 1969 and the destruction of all existing stockpiles of bioweapons. In 1978–1979, the Rhodesian government used anthrax against cattle and humans during its campaign against black rebels.[64] The Soviet Union created and stored 100 to 200 tons of anthrax spores at Kantubek on Vozrozhdeniya Island. They were abandoned in 1992 and destroyed in 2002.
American military and British Army personnel are routinely vaccinated against anthrax prior to active service in places where biological attacks are considered a threat.
Sverdlovsk incident (2 April 1979)[edit]
Main article: Sverdlovsk anthrax leak
Despite signing the 1972 agreement to end bioweapon production, the government of the Soviet Union had an active bioweapons program that included the production of hundreds of tons of weapons-grade anthrax after this period. On 2 April 1979, some of the over one million people living in Sverdlovsk (now called Ekaterinburg, Russia), about 850 miles east of Moscow, were exposed to an accidental release of anthrax from a biological weapons complex located near there. At least 94 people were infected, of whom at least 68 died. One victim died four days after the release, 10 over an eight-day period at the peak of the deaths, and the last six weeks later. Extensive cleanup, vaccinations, and medical interventions managed to save about 30 of the victims.[65] Extensive cover-ups and destruction of records by the KGB continued from 1979 until Russian President Boris Yeltsin admitted this anthrax accident in 1992. Jeanne Guillemin reported in 1999 that a combined Russian and United States team investigated the accident in 1992.[65][66][67]
Nearly all of the night-shift workers of a ceramics plant directly across the street from the biological facility (compound 19) became infected, and most died. Since most were men, some NATO governments suspected the Soviet Union had developed a sex-specific weapon.[68] The government blamed the outbreak on the consumption of anthrax-tainted meat, and ordered the confiscation of all uninspected meat that entered the city. They also ordered all stray dogs to be shot and people not have contact with sick animals. Also, a voluntary evacuation and anthrax vaccination program was established for people from 18–55.[69]
To support the cover-up story, Soviet medical and legal journals published articles about an outbreak in livestock that caused GI anthrax in people having consumed infected meat, and cutaneous anthrax in people having come into contact with the animals. All medical and public health records were confiscated by the KGB.[69] In addition to the medical problems the outbreak caused, it also prompted Western countries to be more suspicious of a covert Soviet bioweapons program and to increase their surveillance of suspected sites. In 1986, the US government was allowed to investigate the incident, and concluded the exposure was from aerosol anthrax from a military weapons facility.[70] In 1992, President Yeltsin admitted he was "absolutely certain" that "rumors" about the Soviet Union violating the 1972 Bioweapons Treaty were true. The Soviet Union, like the US and UK, had agreed to submit information to the UN about their bioweapons programs, but omitted known facilities and never acknowledged their weapons program.[68]
Anthrax bioterrorism[edit]
In theory, anthrax spores can be cultivated with minimal special equipment and a first-year collegiate microbiological education.[71] To make large amounts of an aerosol form of anthrax suitable for biological warfare requires extensive practical knowledge, training, and highly advanced equipment.[citation needed]
Concentrated anthrax spores were used for bioterrorism in the 2001 anthrax attacks in the United States, delivered by mailing postal letters containing the spores.[72] The letters were sent to several news media offices and two Democratic senators: Tom Daschle of South Dakota and Patrick Leahy of Vermont. As a result, 22 were infected and five died.[22] Only a few grams of material were used in these attacks and in August 2008, the US Department of Justice announced they believed that Dr. Bruce Ivins, a senior biodefense researcher employed by the United States government, was responsible.[73] These events also spawned many anthrax hoaxes.
Due to these events, the U.S. Postal Service installed biohazard detection systems at its major distribution centers to actively scan for anthrax being transported through the mail.[74]
Decontaminating mail[edit]
In response to the postal anthrax attacks and hoaxes, the Postal Service sterilized some mail using gamma irradiation and treatment with a proprietary enzyme formula supplied by Sipco Industries Ltd.[75]
A scientific experiment performed by a high school student, later published in The Journal of Medical Toxicology, suggested a domestic electric iron at its hottest setting (at least 400 °F) used for at least 5 minutes should destroy all anthrax spores in a common postal envelope.[76]
2014 anthrax outbreak in India[edit]
In October 2014, an outbreak of anthrax in a village in India allegedly killed seven people. The village was located in the Simdega district within the Indian state of Jharkhand. Indian government health personnel quarantined 30 houses as a result. Officials traced the anthrax spores to a cow, and found that people who had touched the dead cow or eaten from it became infected. The Indian equivalent of the CDC said at the time that the outbreak was one of the biggest in recent years in terms of deaths.[77]
Government officials sent samples of the suspected anthrax to a laboratory in Delhi for confirmation testing. People with the victims reported that the victims vomited blood and complained of chest and stomach aches.[78]
The Hindustan Times, an English-language newspaper in India,[79] reported that village residents lynched a man who had treated some anthrax patients with herbs.[80]
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