Anthrax

What is anthrax?

An infection caused by a germ (a bacterium) that mostly lives in farm animals like cattle, sheep and goats. Its tough seeds, called spores, can survive in soil for a long time.

Signs

Most often an itchy bump on the skin that turns into a black sore. Eating infected meat can cause bad stomach pain, vomiting blood and diarrhoea. Breathing it in causes cold-like illness, then serious breathing trouble.

How it spreads

By handling or cutting up sick animals, or touching their meat, blood, wool, hides or bones. It almost never passes from one person to another.

How to protect yourself

Never eat or use animals that were sick or died suddenly. Vaccinating livestock protects people too. A human vaccine exists but is mainly kept for people whose work puts them at risk.

Get medical help

See a doctor straight away if you get a black skin sore or feel ill after contact with sick animals or their meat. Everyone with anthrax needs hospital care and antibiotics.

In Dooram's words, from the World Health Organization. Source: WHO Regional Office for Europe: Anthrax (questions and answers), read 8 October 2026. General information, not medical advice.