'Anthrax prevalent in Bheemunipatnam'

By Our Staff Reporter

VISAKHAPATNAM, OCT. 20. Dr. Narra Lokanatha Rao, a medical practitioner at Beemunipatnam in Visakhapatnam district, has come across 52 cases of anthrax in his hospital since 1988, a fact which the district administration and district medical and health authorities refuse to acknowledge.

He told reporters on Saturday that the medical team constituted by the district administration last week with the District Medical and Health Officer heading the team had not conducted a proper inquiry into the facts given by him and ``has ritualistically gone to a few villages in a jeep and within 48 hours announced in the media that there is no anthrax prevailing in the district.''

The disease is prevalent among goat and sheep-rearing families in many villages in and around Bheemunipatnam, he said and showed photographs and video clippings to mediapersons. He said that he had sent these documents to Dr. Martin Hew, Anthrax Research and Control Coordinator at the World Health Organisation, and after careful examination of all records, the latter had confirmed that they were cases of anthrax.

Dr. Rao said that his intention of exposing the cases of anthrax at this juncture was not to frighten people, but ask the Government not to neglect the disease and make a thorough examination of all facts placed before it and take necessary actions to prevent it.

The first case was that of one Kongarani Ramana in 1988, who had come to him with a small pimple-like boil for which treatment was given, but within 12 days he returned with a large swelling around the neck and jaws and went into a coma. It was this incident, which had made him to study deep into the case and for the first time suspect that it was anthrax.

Dr. Rao said that he had discussed the case history with some other doctors of Visakhapatnam also and it was conclusively determined only in 1990 that the case was that of anthrax. Every year after that, he had been detecting the disease among at least seven or eight persons through symptoms and clinical tests.

Vijayarampuram and Majjipeta villages near Bheemunipatnam had reported many anthrax cases and most them were either shepherds or goat-rearing people, who lived along with animals in the same enclosure during nights.

Preventive dose

Dr. Moturi Sri Rama Krishna, vice-president of the Indian Institute of Homoeopathic Physicians, announced at the press conference that a preventive medicine for anthrax was available in homoeopathy.

``A single dose of `Anthraxinium' (200 potency) keeps the disease away,'' he said and added that it had been conclusively proved many a time.

The IIHP would launch a major camp for the free distribution of the medicine at surrounding villages of Bheemunipatnam first within a couple of days and had approached the district administration to coordinate with them for the free disbursal of the preventive dose of the medicine wherever it was essential, said Dr. Rama Krishna.

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