[Mike]

I’m sending this to both Chemtrails and Strangeanimaldeaths because the article mentions the weather as a factor which I think is very odd. I’ve never heard of anthrax as a problem in Africa.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=570&ncid=570&e=6&u=/nm/20041005/sc_nm/environment_anthrax_dc

Anthrax Kills 120 Hippos in Ugandan National Park
Tue Oct 5, 6:56 AM ET By By Daniel Wallis

KAMPALA, Uganda (Reuters) – An anthrax outbreak has killed 120 hippos in Uganda, raising the toll from a disease that has claimed hundreds of wild animals in Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia in recent weeks, a senior official said Tuesday.

The cause of the outbreaks is unclear, but Ugandan wildlife officials say there is a possibility that similar weather patterns in the afflicted areas may have contributed to the spread of the disease.

Anthrax occurs when animals ingest remnants of vegetation in the driest months of September and October, absorbing bacterial spores that can live for decades in dry soil.

The Ugandan outbreak, one its worst mass deaths of big game from disease in years, occurred in the Queen Elizabeth National Park, about 350 km (220 miles) southwest of the capital and home to about half the country’s 10,000 hippos.

“We took samples, we analyzed them in our laboratory and we saw anthrax spores,” Nicholas Kauta, Uganda’s commissioner of livestock, told Reuters.

Kauta said officials would keep monitoring movements of the animals to detect any signs the disease would spread.

“As of now, the disease seems to be dying out, but we cannot say that for sure because we have not yet established its epidemiology,” he said.

He said secondary tests carried out by the Robert Koch Institute in Berlin confirmed the Ugandan results.

Kauta said game wardens at the park, a popular tourist attraction, had recorded only one hippo death in the last week.

Anthrax can be transmitted to people who cut up, carry or eat the meat of dead animals.

Ugandan officials have warned residents in the area not to touch hippo carcasses after newspapers reported that two people had died after eating infected hippo flesh.

Zimbabwean officials say more than 2,000 animals, including 100 buffalo, died in the biggest outbreak of anthrax in its private nature sanctuaries, but say the disease is now under control.

Namibian officials said last month an anthrax outbreak in Botswana’s Chobe National Park spread across the border and killed elephants and buffalo.