National Agricultural Biosecurity Center

Anthrax

Anthrax is a potentially fatal zoonotic disease that primarily affects livestock and other herbivores (e.g., cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, deer, and water buffalo). According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), anthrax, along with botulinum toxin, hemorrhagic fever viruses, smallpox, and tularemia, pose the greatest hazard to public health, based on their death rates, ease of dissemination and transmission, and potential to inspire public panic. Bacillus anthracis, the causative agent for anthrax, is an encapsulated, gram-positive, nonmotile, aerobic, spore-forming bacterial rod which can be found worldwide. The spores are extremely stable and usually found in the soil; livestock and other herbivores usually contract anthrax from consuming contaminated soil. Prevalence of spores seems to vary with soil type, land use, and climate. For example, environmental persistence appears to be related to a number of factors, such as soil nitrogen and organic content, alkaline soil (a pH higher than 6.0), ambient temperature higher than 15°C, and dramatic changes in climate (e.g., drought causes livestock to forage much closer to the ground and heavy rains increases the concentration of spores caught in standing water). Anthrax is endemic in Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Central and South America, parts of Europe, and Mexico. Transmission can occur via several routes, such as ingestion, inhalation, and cutaneous; and, clinical signs are different depending on the route of infection and the species affected.

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