Anthrax

[Gr., charcoal.] ( Path.) A name formerly applied to the painful eruption known as carbuncle, but now used for a widely distributed and very destructive disease, most common among sheep and cattle, but occasionally attacking man. It is now known to be due to the action of a special micro-organism, the bacillus anthracis, and is of interest as being the first disease traced to this cause, and as giving rise to the GERM THEORY OF DISEASE ( q. v.). It has been known by many names, including Splenic Apoplexy, Splenic Fever, Siberian Plague, Charbon, ., and in man as Malignant Pustule, Wool-sorter's Disease, . In addition to cattle and sheep, it is very destructive to horses and camels, attacks many of the smaller herbivorous mammals, and may be contracted by domestic fowls. In the most acute cases the animal falls as if it had received a severe blow, and goes into convulsions; death soon following. Even when le acute, it is apt to recur after seeming recovery, and death frequently follows within two days' time. Man is not very susceptible to it, but is occasionally attacked when exposed to its influence, as in the case of the affection known as woolsorter's disease, a rapidly fatal illne which attacks those working among wool. It takes the form of a malignant eruption, or a gangrene, attended with dangerous internal disorder of the system. The bacillus anthracis is a minute, rod-shaped organism, of persistent vitality and very rapid increase, multiplying in the blood of affected animals. Anthropogenia, ( ăn - thro -po - je'ne-ah) n. [From Gr. anthropos, man, and genesis , generation]. ( Biol .) The knowledge, or study, or phenomena of human generation.