Biological warfare is the deliberate spreading disease and chemical agents amongst human, animals, including all living creatures in combatants. This type of warfare used the spread of germs to reach further goals in one combatant. Until 20 century, these weapons’ transmission was limited to “starting fires, poisoning wells, shooting poisoned arrows, plagues, infections.” Biological weapon can be in form of gas such as tear gas, chlorine gas etc. and also in liquid, viruses, bacteria, rickettsia, toxins, and fungi. As a result, these agents are exceeding effective, cheap, and deadly due to their highly contagious characteristic, which produced a high rate of elimination of targets.
Biological weapon is extremely cheap and deadly comparing to…show more content… Mycotoxins are one of them. The Trichothecene Mycotoxins, also called “Yellow rain” are a highly toxic compound that can be spread easily by various methods. They are produced by a “certain species of fungi”, and they are fairly easy to produce. They dispersed themselves through: “dusts, droplets, aerosols, smoke, rockets, artillery mines, portable sprays), which made them excellent if it was weaponized. But these toxins are required to have a certain solution and high heat in order to completely inactivate it. According research, there are strong evidences that the Trichothecene Mycotoxins are used as a biological warfare in Afghanistan and Southwest Asia. From 1974 – 1981, attacks that used the Trichothecene resulted a minimum of “6,310 death in Lao, 981 deaths in Cambodia and 3,042 deaths in Afghanistan.” The number of death is due to the symptoms it has. The “Yellow rain” can cause massive organ damage, and signs occur after exposure. “Early symptoms begin with 5 minutes and full effects take 60 minutes in total. If skin exposure occurs, skin burns, then becomes tender and eventually falls off. If exposures by breathing, resulted shortness of breathe, bloody nose, nasal itching and pain, etc. If ingested resulted vomits, bloody diarrhea. Entering through eyes caused redness, pain etc. Death may occur after exposure, within minutes to days. And…show more content… Ricin is a kind of plant toxin that can also be easily produced, but still has powerful toxin. Although it’s fewer toxins than “botulinum toxin”, but Ricin can be rapidly produce and which give it potential of biological weapon. The Ricin came from the beans of the castor plant. Since ancient time, there were already more than 750 cases that include usage of the Ricin. In 1978, London, the “killing of Bulgarian exile Geogri Markov” occurred to be a Ricin case. The victim was attacked with “a device in an umbrella implanted a Ricin-containing pellet into his thigh. Although it is toxic, but Ricin’s levels of toxicity varied a lot and it’s depended on the way given. For example: if ingested, resulted pain in the GI tract. If injected, reaction takes place only in that area. But Ricin is extremely toxic when reacting with cells and inhibiting protein synthesis. If animals breathe in, death will occur in 36 to 48 hours. Ingested exposure was experimented with 751 victims, and only 14 of them resulted in death. Until now, there is still no vaccine available for this situation, but dose and certain drag did work on animals. Other doses and drags are being