|
|
|
|
Heading off anthrax
|
FDA Approves
Antiterrorist Antibiotic
Drug approved to treat airborne anthrax |
Report suspicious packages, early symptoms, experts urge!
|
AUTHORITIES are
urging Americans to be familiar with the early symptoms of anthrax and report any
suspicious letter or package to law enforcement, as each of the anthrax cases so far have
been somehow linked to powdery substances arriving in the mail.
While the anthrax germs are invisible to the eye, they must be
mixed with some sort of additive usually a powder of some sort to keep them
from clumping together, which makes the microbe less infectious, according to experts.
Lets say you have an envelope and you think there is
powder inside, or you happen to open it and you see powder, leave it where it is, get up,
leave that room, go to another room, and call 911. Explain what it is and then the police
and haz-mat people will take over. Theyll test it and the vast majority of times
its going to turn out to be talcum powder or something like that. But given the fact
you never know, thats probably the best way, advised New York Mayor Rudolph
Giuliani.
|
|
KNOW THE SYMPTOMS
|
People also should be aware
of early symptoms of anthrax which vary depending on how the disease was contracted
because when caught early it can be effectively treated with antibiotics.
The most common form of anthrax is cutaneous, which occurs when
the germ enters a wound on the skin, as was the case with the NBC News employee in New
York. The infection begins as a raised itchy bump similar to an insect bite that develops
into a fluid-filled sac within a day or two. Then it becomes an ulcer with a dark area in
the center the hallmark of cutaneous anthrax.
Initial signs of intestinal anthrax, which can follow eating
contaminated food, are nausea, loss of appetite, vomiting and fever. Then, abdominal pain,
vomiting of blood and severe diarrhea can develop.
Unfortunately, the early symptoms of inhalation anthrax, the
deadliest form of the disease, are similar to those of a cold. After several days,
however, the symptoms may progress to severe breathing problems and shock |

|
Anthrax can be very deadly when its not caught
promptly, so health officials urge people to go to their doctor with any of the early
symptoms.
But with flu season starting, some doctors are
worried that achy muscles and a cough will send hordes of people scrambling to the
emergency room.
So Dr. Mohammad Akhter, executive director of the
American Public Health Association, urges Americans to get vaccinated.
The best thing this flu season really is to go
get the flu vaccine so you can at least rule that possibility out, he advised. |
|
ANTIBIOTIC WARNING
Three types of antibiotics
are approved for preventing and treating anthrax: ciprofloxacin, tetracyclines and
penicillins. People who have been exposed to the germ but do not have symptoms are given
an antibiotic for 60 days to reduce the risk of developing the disease. |
|
|
What people should not do, health
officials said, is demand antibiotics from their doctors.
Physicians have a tremendous responsibility here,
said U.S. Surgeon General David Satcher. If these drugs are used inappropriately,
the organism is going to develop resistance to them. The worst thing you can do is
contribute to these organisms becoming resistant.
Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson on Friday
asked people not to hoard anthrax antibiotics, saying the government had enough to treat
those who might require the drugs.
|
|
|
|