Even though anthrax has killed cattle on 11 Manitoba farms and infected dozens of U.S. counties in North and South Dakota, Canadian and American disease control specialists say they aren’t worried.
“It’s expected we’d see these types of situations arise when we have flooding followed by drying out,” said Canadian Food Inspection Agency veterinarian Sandra Stephens.
“It’s not behaving in an unusual manner.”
The 11 farms infected in southern Manitoba are all in an area that was saturated this spring, then dried up in late summer.
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The infected counties in the Dakotas have had similar conditions.
More than 140 farms and 700 animals this summer have been infected with anthrax, a bacteria that can survive in the soil for a century before developing.
Flooding helps bring the spores closer to the surface and heat helps them develop.
Stephens said her agency has not been in close contact with U.S. counterparts nor has it established any special approach to handling the outbreak because there is nothing unusual about it. The fact that the American outbreaks are occurring under circumstances similar to those in Canada supports that conclusion.
“It would be the same type of environmental conditions (on the American side),” said Stephens.
“All that area has a similar type of terrain and a lot of rain this spring and that resulted in a lot of flooding.”
Animals infected with anthrax stumble, pass blood and collapse. Humans rarely develop the disease even if they are in close contact with infected animals. People should not get close to an infected animal’s fluids nor should they open an infected animal’s carcass.
Generally, infected carcasses are buried deep or incinerated. Spores can stay with the carcass for decades.
Certain strains of anthrax have been developed that can easily infect and quickly kill human beings, but these strains are restricted to military arsenals and perhaps some terrorist groups.
In 2001 an unknown person or group spread modified anthrax by mail in the eastern United States, killing a number of people.
An explosion at a Soviet biological warfare factory in Siberia caused a local outbreak that killed more than 100 people during the Cold War.
Weaponized anthrax has not been found in agricultural areas of North America.