The government on Sunday announced red alert across the country over anthrax infection, which has so far been reported from five districts.
Twenty-six cases of anthrax infection were first detected in Sirajganj on August 29. Now the total number of cases of anthrax infection has reached 327 till Sunday when the Institute of Epidemiology Disease Control and Research reported 29 fresh cases of anthrax infection. Other places from where the infection has been reported are Pabna, Tangail, Kushita and Meherpur.
The fisheries and livestock minister, Abdul Latif Biswas, announced red alert and said the livestock directorate, civil surgeons and relevant offices had been asked to remain alert.
The health minister, AFM Ruhal Haque, however, said red alert had been issued only for livestock. Anthrax infection in humans is still under control, he said.
He said anthrax infection mainly spread through cattle and it cannot spread from humans to humans.
Ruhal claimed the situation of anthrax infection in humans was under control and stock of medicine was adequate.
The IEDCR director, Mahmudur Rahman, said 29 fresh cases of anthrax infection were detected, including in Meherpur, taking to 327 the total number of anthrax infection cases.
Seventeen patients were detection at Daulatpur in Kushtia, 10 in Meherpur and 2 at Kamarkhand in Sirajganj, he said.
The minister said committees had been instituted in districts, with livestock officers and civil surgeons, to combat the situation. The surveillance will be stronger in border areas to stop entrance of anthrax-infected cattle, he said.
Local physicians first detected 26 anthrax patients at Chithulia, a village of Shahzadpur in Sirajganj, on August 19. The infection subsequently spread to the Pabna, Tangail and Kushtia and now to Meherpur.
The Dhaka Medical College Hospital director said two anthrax patients were had been referred to the hospital from Sirajganj on August 30 as their condition deteriorated. ‘Both of them are now out of danger.’
Anthrax commonly infects both wild and pet animals which ingest or inhale the bacterium while grazing, physicians said. Diseased animals can then spread anthrax to humans, either by direct contact or through consumption of their meat.
ASM Alamgir, senior scientific officer at the IEDCR, said there are three forms of the disease caused by anthrax — cutaneous anthrax, inhalation anthrax and gastrointestinal anthrax.
He said the patients of cutaneous anthrax or skin anthrax complained with red-brown raised spots that enlarge with considerable redness around it.
The patients with inhalation anthrax suffer serious respiratory problems and pneumonia, Alamgir said, adding that gastrointestinal anthrax patients have the problem of nausea and diarrhoea.
He said all recent cases identified with anthrax are cutaneous anthrax which can easily be treated with antibiotic. The two other types of anthrax infection in humans are rare in Bangladesh, the scientist said.
Alamgir said if meat cooked at 120 degrees Celsius would be sterilised. ‘People can cook meat in pressure cooker or oven,’ he said.
