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Insight into Horror: Designing a Biological Warfare Agent

The use of biological agents in warfare or by terrorists is a frightening but unfortunately realistic concern today. Studies of an unusual outbreak of anthrax in the former Soviet Union now provide further understanding of how such agents may be designed and how the disease they produce may differ from natural infection.

Although official reports first linked a 1979 outbreak of anthrax in Sverdlovsk to the consumption of contaminated meat, subsequent epidemiologic studies indicated that this outbreak arose from the release of an aerosol of Bacillus anthracis spores from a military research facility. Two scientists retained tissue samples from necropsies of outbreak victims, and formalin-fixed tissues from 11 victims have now been analyzed for the presence of B. anthracis-specific DNA sequences. Samples from all victims demonstrated the presence of B. anthracis virulence genes not present in an anthrax vaccine that had been in use in the former Soviet Union. Additionally, analysis of one variable gene distinguishing B. anthracis subtypes showed that several victims had been infected with multiple anthrax strains. In contrast, no naturally acquired anthrax infection has been found to be due to more than one B. anthracis subtype.

Comment: This report provides evidence that those who died in Sverdlovsk did not succumb to a natural infection. Moreover, physicians who may have to care for victims of biological warfare agents should anticipate that infections may simultaneously arise from multiple different bacterial strains differing in virulence or antimicrobial susceptibilities.

— R Ellison

Published in Journal Watch Infectious Diseases April 1, 1998

Citation(s):

Jackson PJ et al. PCR analysis of tissue samples from the 1979 Sverdlovsk anthrax victims: The presence of multiple Bacillus anthracis strains in different victims. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 1998 Feb 95 1224-1229.

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