Anthrax test kit

At the conclusion of this station, you should be familiar with commercially available or locally assembled test kits to rule out anthrax spores or other biological agents. 

HazMat teams are usually called to evaluate unknown powders but in many places this is done by law enforcement. Remember tbat this is only a screening test. You should save samples for evidence and for further testing. The value of the test is that if the substance is suspicious for anthrax (you do not have to have positives on all six parts to be suspicious), you will know to quarantine the area until more sophisticated tests can be done to confirm your screening test. If the test is completely negative for anthrax, you would still send a sample for further testing and save a sample for evidence, but you would only need to clean the area, not quarantine it. 

You should identify the situation (suspicious unknown powder) as one requiring an initiai fieid test for a bioiogicai agent. 

Obtain the appropriate kit and assembie the parts before approaching the suspicious powder. 

You should select and put on the appropriate PPE (at least Level C). Use of the test requires fine motor use of your hands, so you should choose nitrile gloves rather than butyl rubber. 

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When you are called to evaluate a suspicious powder, think of anthrax spores and radioactive material. W>u can use the anthrax test kit (see Practical Skills 4 ) and a radiation detection device ( Practical Skills 6 ) for field testing. 

Figure S4.3 Components of a homemade anthrax test kit. Note the white powder on the tip of the spatula.

You may be called upon to identily whether a powder is anthrax or just a hoax. There are several commercial kits (Figures S4.1 and S4.2) with which to do this, and some manulacturers offer training kits for their tests. The individual tests are relatively inexpensive, hut you can also obtain the components of a useful anthrax screening test at your local pharmacy. The active components of the test are simply urine pH and protein test strips (Figure S4.3). 

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