5 ms·
Fine dust gets lofted high in the atmosphere. Some bacteria can handle being dried out for long periods and act as fine particles. As I recall, one of the victi
by marshray 8y ago
Fine dust gets lofted high in the atmosphere. Some bacteria can handle being dried out for long periods and act as fine particles. As I recall, one of the victims of the anthrax terror attacks was a woman who lived several miles downwind of an affected Post Office.
But good for these researchers for working out the details, and I'm sure there's a lot more in the paper that didn't make it into the article.
- steve19 8y agoIs one bacteria landing on your tongue, being sucked up your nose or inhaled into your lungs going to do anything? Are there any bacteria and virus that can kill with just one making contact?
- k_sze 8y agoIt’s called “infectious dose”, and it’s largely about probabilities. See this question that I asked a while ago (and associated answers) on Biology SE: https://biology.stackexchange.com/questions/5442/are-all-known-germs-benign-in-small-enough-quantities-i-e-why-do-we-wash-our-h https://biology.stackexchange.com/questions/5442/are-all-kno... EDIT: added missing URL.
- Symmetry 8y agoApparently for Anthrax the LD1, the dose expected to kill 1% of the population exposed to it, is just 1 to 3 spores. So it's possisble that woman downwind of the post office might have just inhaled a single spore. http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/infectious-disease-topics/anthrax http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/infectious-disease-topics/anthrax