Britain, December 24: Heroin laced with anthrax is being sold on the streets of Britain and has already killed two people in Glasgow, prompting warnings to addicts to be on their guard, The Times reported.
Tests on a third person were being carried out to see if he died from the same disease.
A fourth and fifth were being treated for anthrax after injecting heroin from a batch contaminated with the lethal spores, doctors disclosed today.
The two surviving patients were responding well to treatment, doctors said.
Syed Ahmed, consultant in public health medicine, said: “I urge all drug-injecting heroin users to be extremely alert and to seek urgent medical advice if they experience an infection.”
Dr Ahmed added: “While this section of the community need to be on their guard the risk to the rest of the population — including close family members of the infected cases — is negligible. It is extremely rare for anthrax to be spread from person to person and there is no significant risk of airborne transmission.”
Anthrax was suspected of being responsible for a series of deaths among Scottish heroin addicts in 2000.
Anthrax is an acute bacterial infection most commonly found in cloven hoofed animals such as cattle, sheep and goats.
—Agencies