There are great expectations for the Ukrainian spring offensive. After Vladimir Putin escalated the war that has lasted since 2014 and went to a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on the night of February 24 last year, fighting has raged in the war-torn country. From taking Kyiv in three days, Russian soldiers are now digging trenches along the front line in Ukraine to hold their ground against what is expected to be a powerful counter-offensive from Ukraine sometime in the spring of 2023.
Some people are speculating whether the offensive will start already at the turn of April/May, but what plans the Ukrainian generals have should be known by as few as five people. The only thing that is certain is that the West, led by the United States, has delivered huge quantities of weapons systems, armored vehicles and tanks to Ukraine. On Thursday this week, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that more than 98 percent of the vehicles promised were already in place in Ukraine.
Read also: Russian media: Ukrainian kamikaze drone fell over Moscow
The Fades in Kharkiv
Despite a major rearmament and thorough training of the Ukrainian forces, no one expects a repeat of last year’s storm offensive in Kharkiv. Then the Ukrainians took both Russia and the rest of the world to bed as they advanced at a breakneck pace and reconquered large areas of land.
After the debacle in Kharkiv, Vladimir Putin introduced a so-called partial mobilization, bringing in around 300,000 new soldiers. Despite heavy Russian losses, especially in Bakhmut, the Russians are better prepared for a Ukrainian counter-offensive this time, and since last autumn have been digging trenches and preparing defensive positions to prevent Ukraine from regaining more territory.
Read also: Supposed to have received 16,000 “applications” – now Syrian soldiers are appearing in Ukraine
Many, including Russians, speculate that a Ukrainian offensive will come in Zaporizhzhya and move down towards the Sea of Azov. Then Russian forces on the Crimean peninsula will be cut off from mainland Russia and become dependent on the now well-known Kerch Bridge, which connects Crimea with Russia.
The bridge was exposed to a bomb attack last year, and it is still unclear whether trains, which are Russia’s most important tool for supplying the troops, can run over the bridge as normal.
Read also: Attacking behind enemy lines – Norwegian donation can play a central role
An uneasy encounter with Ukrainian soil
On Thursday, Nettavisen’s columnist Jørn Sund-Henriksen wrote that the Ukrainian offensive may already be underway, and it is in the work to prevent this offensive that at least two Russian soldiers have had an unpleasant encounter with what is hiding in Ukrainian soil.
Read more: Ukraine’s offensive may already be underway
The Ukrainian mayor of Melitopol, Ivan Fedorov, was kidnapped by Russian soldiers when they took control of the city last year. He was eventually freed in a prisoner exchange, and has subsequently been active in disseminating news from the home town he has now had to flee from.
Earlier this week he wrote on the messaging service Telegram that two Russian soldiers who were digging trenches somewhere in Zaporizhzhya were infected with anthrax, what we call anthrax in Norwegian. This is said to have happened when the Russian soldiers were digging in an area that has been used to bury cattle infected with the disease. The two soldiers were initially taken to a hospital in Melitopol, but were quarantined at an unknown location, along with the rest of the unit they belong to.
Also read: This detail speeds up the Putin rumours
The Telegraph writes that anthrax was a major problem in the Soviet Union, but that in recent years the disease has been brought under control.
FHI writes on its website that the anthrax bacterium has potential as a biological warfare agent, and that both the USA, the Soviet Union and countries in Western Europe have researched this. In 1979 there was an accident at a bioweapons factory in present-day Yekaterinburg in Russia. The accident led to airborne contamination with anthrax bacteria and 66 people died.
Also read: Russian super tank discovered in the US
Norway burns carcasses
Solveig Jore is a senior researcher at FHI and works in the department for infection control and preparedness. She tells Nettavisen that it is very rare for people to be infected by anthrax directly from the soil. Norway has also had anthrax throughout history. The last serious outbreak was in 1937. From 1889 to 1939 (before antibiotics were available) over 100 human cases were described in this country.
In Norway, it has been customary to burn cadavers that have been infected with anthrax, before they have been buried, while in Sweden, to a greater extent, they have only buried the cadavers and started burning cadavers later.
Also read: Can run out of young men: – It’s going the wrong way
– In Sweden, there have been several animal outbreaks in connection with the discovery of old animal graves with anthrax carcasses. Ineffective spores from such graves can be spread further and give rise to new infections in both animals and possibly humans. However, humans are not as sensitive as animals to getting the infection, but the Swedish authorities still advise against digging by hand in such graves and that in that case you must use special protective equipment. . However, experiences and assessments made by Swedish authorities show that they consider the risk to be “a very low risk for people to be infected during excavation work in the vicinity of and in an anthrax grave”, she writes in an email to Nettavisen.
According to Jore, as far as she knows, no people have been infected with anthrax after coming into contact with anthrax carcasses that have been buried in Sweden.
Anthrax
The disease anthrax is caused by the spore-forming bacterium, Bacillus anthracis. This is a bacterium that causes disease in both humans and a number of animals, especially cattle. It used to be common to bury animals that die of this disease to prevent further infection to other animals and people. However, the spores of the bacterium are very resistant and can lie inactive in the soil for decades, perhaps over 100 years, under favorable conditions if animal carcasses are not burned.
Humans are most often infected by animals, directly or indirectly, and can become infected by breathing in infectious spores, by eating or drinking food/water contaminated with spores or through cuts/wounds in the skin. Direct infection to humans from soil contaminated with anthrax spores occurs very rarely. There are many different forms of anthrax, depending on the method of exposure (mode of infection). Human disease has 3 different forms: skin anthrax (cutaneous), gastrointestinal or lung anthrax (pulmonary). Most common is skin anthrax, which today accounts for 95% of cases (from infection through wounds/cuts), the rest of the cases are the “pulmonary form” of anthrax and this “gastrointestinal form” of the disease. Skin anthrax causes few general symptoms and most cases of skin infections resolve on their own without treatment. Gastrointestinal anthrax and inhalation anthrax cause more serious illness and have a higher mortality rate. If you get a systemic disease and don’t get antibiotic treatment, you can get general flu-like symptoms that quickly develop into blood poisoning, coagulation disorders, shock, multi-organ failure and possibly hemorrhagic meningitis. Therefore, early diagnosis and treatment with antibiotics is important for those who have been exposed to the bacteria. Mortality is 45% for inhalation anthrax, 40% for gastrointestinal anthrax, and <2% for cutaneous anthrax.
In Sweden, there have been several animal outbreaks in connection with old animal graves with anthrax carcasses being exposed. Infectious spores from such graves can be spread further and give rise to new infections in both animals and possibly humans. However, humans are not as sensitive as animals to getting the infection, but the Swedish authorities still advise against digging by hand in such graves and that in that case you must use special protective equipment (see Swedish page for more info). However, experience and assessments made by Swedish authorities show that they consider the risk to be “a very low risk for people to be infected during excavation work in the vicinity of and in an anthrax grave”.
For more information about anthrax, you can read more on FHI’s website.
Source: Solveig Jore, senior researcher at FHI.
Read also: Ukrainian pilots say they are tricked into flying around
2023-04-29 14:03:48
#kidnapped #Putins #men #claim #Russians #huge #mess
