NCJ Number
191335
Date Published
1999
Length
339 pages
Annotation
This book aims to determine the cause of and provide an account of the scientific investigation into an anthrax epidemic in the Soviet city of Sverdlovsk in 1979 in which 64 people died.
Abstract
Anthrax, Bacillus anthracis, is found naturally in soil and can be passed from grazing animals to humans. It could have been the "morain" mentioned in Exodus and the "burning wind of plague" depicted in Homer's Iliad. It can affect humans in three ways: through the skin, in the intestines, and in the lungs. The last form is almost always fatal, while the other two cause fatalities about 20 percent of the time. The Biological Weapons Convention was completed in 1972 with 140 states agreeing to it. In March 1980, during the first review session of the convention in Geneva, the U.S. Department of State raised its initial concern that the Sverdlovsk outbreak signaled a violation of the convention. Some accounts had 30 to 40 people dying every day. At first the Soviet Union explained the outbreak as a result of improper handling of meat products. Some Americans persisted in calling for a scientific investigation of the outbreak. As the Cold War came to an end, questions remained whether trust in the Soviet Union's adherence to the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) had been misplaced. Would the new Russia be able to reveal violations at its facilities? The author traced the disease's progression, starting with a trip in 1992. Most hospital records had been lost or confiscated by the KGB. The author found many of the victims' families and received their accounts of the outbreak. The investigation led to focusing on anthrax contamination through an aerosol from a ceramic pipe factory in Sverdlovsk. On April 2, victims were exposed to a plume of aerosolized anthrax that traveled at a rate of about 15 kilometers an hour. It proceeded to the countryside where it infected livestock. The release violated the BWC. Appendices, references, index.