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Inhalation anthrax
2025 Case Definition

Inhalation anthrax
2025 Case Definition
NOTE: A surveillance case definition is a set of uniform criteria used to define a disease for public health surveillance. Surveillance case definitions enable public health officials to classify and count cases consistently across reporting jurisdictions. Surveillance case definitions are not intended to be used by healthcare providers for making a clinical diagnosis or determining how to meet an individual patient’s health needs.

Subtype(s)

  • Anthrax
  • Cutaneous anthrax
  • Ingestion anthrax
  • Injection anthrax
  • Welder's anthrax

Clinical Description

Often described as a biphasic illness. Specific symptoms include pleural effusion or mediastinal widening, or hemorrhagic mediastinal lymphadenopathy. Early nonspecific symptoms of inhalation anthrax include fever and fatigue. Localized thoracic symptoms such as cough, chest pain, and shortness of breath follow, as may non-thoracic symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, headache, diaphoresis, and altered mental status. Lung sounds are often abnormal.

Related Case Definition(s)

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National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System (NNDSS)

NNDSS receives and shares case data from state, local, and territorial health departments to help public health monitor, control, and prevent serious diseases.

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