FIVE MORE WITH ANTHRAX - At American Media

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BBC Saturday, 13 October, 2001, 22:19 GMT 23:19 UK

Five more 'infected with anthrax'

The FBI is searching for a link between the cases

Five more employees of a Florida newspaper company are reported to have anthrax.

A spokesman for American Media Inc, Gerald McKelvey, said the company was told by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that the employees had tested positive.

However, the CDC said it could not confirm this as the tests were not conclusive and would take another few days to complete.

American Media Inc, based in the town of Boca Raton, was the site of the first anthrax scare, after three people tested positive for the bacteria - and one of them died.

Concern about the disease has now spread to the western state of Nevada, after the latest test on a letter sent from Malaysia to a Microsoft office came back positive.

The letter will now be sent to the CDC for further testing, state Governor Kenny Guinn said.

He said six people were believed to have come into contact with the envelope. Health officials believed there was a 'low risk' of exposure to the bacteria.

The news follows confirmation that a letter sent to the New York offices of the American television network NBC has been found to contain traces of anthrax.

That letter - sent from Trenton, New Jersey on 18 September - is believed to have infected an assistant of NBC news anchor Tom Brokaw, who is receiving treatment for anthrax. It contained a brown granular substance.

Another letter, sent on 25 September from Saint Petersburg, Florida, and containing a white powdery substance, was initially believed to have contained anthrax, but has since tested negative.

Earlier, the New York Times announced that white powder found in an envelope sent to one of its reporters also tested negative for anthrax.

That letter was postmarked Saint Petersburg too, as was one containing a similar substance sent to the Saint Petersburg Times.

A BBC correspondent in New York says the discovery that the letters from Saint Petersburg did not contain anthrax has broken the FBI's link with the three cases of anthrax in Florida.

Earlier on Saturday, President George Bush told Americans his government was doing all it could to protect them following a string of cases of anthrax infection.

His comments came after Vice President Dick Cheney said the outbreaks might be linked to the network of the main suspect in the 11 September terror attacks in the US, Osama Bin Laden.

"I understand that many Americans are feeling uneasy," Mr Bush said in his weekly radio address. "But all Americans should be assured: we are taking strong precautions, we are vigilant, we are determined, the country is alert."

The US authorities have been at pains to stress they have no evidence linking the four anthrax cases to Bin Laden.

But the FBI did warn last week that further attacks against the US were possible in the coming days both at home and abroad.

Suspicious mail

Experts believe the anthrax so far discovered is not the specially-made weaponised type which would be used in an attack of mass destruction.

The infected NBC employee was in no danger and was responding well to treatment with antibiotics, the broadcaster said in a statement.

The three other cases, discovered at American Media Inc. in Florida, led to the launch of a criminal investigation.

Another case of suspicious mail, at the State Department in Washington, is being investigated.

Many media companies have refused to accept new mail in the wake of the New York case, and some New Yorkers have been turning up at hospital emergency facilities or buying the antibiotic used to treat anthrax.

-- Anonymous, October 13, 2001

Answers

this is what I was afraid of..it is "dr." with something and he symptoms are not "Definatively" anthrax. but SOMETHING...

-- Anonymous, October 13, 2001

I guess I'm tired from a busy day, but could you expand on that, SAR?

-- Anonymous, October 13, 2001

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