"We have just received----what we regard as reliable"information that plain Penicillin 'G'......is 95% as effective as Cipro for the early control of Anthrax."
Brooks: I found the following on Quackwatch: Roger There have been no clinical trials of Cipro (ciprofloxacin) to treat or prevent anthrax (at least not ones which meet the ethical standards of medical journals. It looks as if the US Army chose ciprofloxacin on the grounds that: i. It achieves good tissue levels, many times over the levels needed to kill the bacterium. ii. It is believed that the Soviet weapons program produced a strain of Bacillus anthracis (the bacterium which causes anthrax) resistant to penicillin and tetracycline, which would otherwise be considered the drugs of choice for wild type anthrax. iii. ciprofloxacin can be given in a simple dosage schedule, and is a drug which is also usable for other possible bioterror agents such as plague and tularaemia. Therefore people in the field are not required to think (always a good idea!) Since there is no indication that the anthrax used in the recent spate of letter attacks is anything other than a fully susceptible strain, penicillin, tetracycine (or, better, oxycycline) would be acceptable. The most important thing to remember is that cephalosporins DO NOT have activity against anthrax. If using a quinolone, of which ciprofloxacin is one, I personally would favour gatifloxacin or moxifloxacin over ciprofloxacin on theoretical grounds. Again, no clinical trials!
