Anthrax

Abstract

Anthrax is a serious disease affecting a wide range of domestic and wild animals as well as humans. Its causative agent, Bacillus anthracis, is a Gram-positive, spore-forming, bacterium. Anthrax is the most important bacterial disease in the camel. Camels usually acquire anthrax as a result of swallowing anthrax spores while grazing on contaminated soils and pastures or drinking from contaminated water sources. Also, inhaling the spores in contaminated dust may occasionally lead to infection. Anthrax in camels may take a peracute, acute or apoplectic form, the affected animals exhibited difficulty in breathing, trembling, and large swellings at the throat, neck, and groins and finally collapsed and died, with dark, un-clotted blood oozing from their natural orifices. Postmortem examination should not be performed on camels suspected of anthrax, any camel that dies suddenly should not be necropsied until a blood smear has been examined and proven negative for anthrax. Bacillus anthracis can be visualized by polychrome methylene blue staining, can be cultured in blood agar and most nutrient agars from swabs of blood, body fluids, and tissues. B. anthracis is sensitive to penicillin, tetracycline, and many other antimicrobial agents.