(UPDATE: Adds comment by Miami company paragraphs 12-13)

By Gilbert Le Gras

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, Oct 20 (Reuters) - Dozens of people carrying letters wrapped in plastic waited to be checked for anthrax infection at a Buenos Aires hospital on Saturday after authorities confirmed a letter sent from Miami to a woman in the Argentine capital was laced with anthrax spores.

``Personally, I'm not afraid because I know it is something that can be cured but I'm worried about the situation in the world,'' Daniel Fernandez told Reuters on his way out of Muniz Hospital. He said about 100 people were waiting to be checked.

Fernandez said he went for a check-up because he received a letter mailed in Miami that bore the logo of a cruise line, similar to the letter received by the woman that health authorities on Friday said carried anthrax spores.

He said there was no powdery substance in the letter he got about a month ago.

Before Friday, Kenya was the only country outside the United States to confirm the presence of the potentially deadly bacteria in a letter. That letter was mailed in Atlanta.

Many Argentines fear their country, the only Latin American nation to send troops to the 1991 Gulf War and a strong ally of the United States, could be a victim of attacks after the Sept. 11 suicide-hijack plane assaults on New York and Washington.

Ten people entered the Muniz Hospital, where the woman was given a clean bill of health on Friday, in the space of 15 minutes carrying letters wrapped in plastic and another six left the hospital over the same time period. Hospital security refused to allow any media access to the building.

NECESSARY MEASURES SAID TAKEN

``The Argentine government is on alert for your safety and is concerned, but the necessary measures have been taken to ensure the integrity of our citizens,'' Interior Minister Ramon Mestre said after an emergency meeting of the Interior Security Council on Saturday with all mail distributors operating in Argentina, public security agencies and airport operators.

News of the confirmation dominated reports in Latin America's third-largest economy, displacing coverage of an ongoing economic crisis that has been one of the focal points of overall emerging market volatility in recent months.

The woman who received the letter in Buenos Aires did not open the envelope but sent it for tests and was believed not to be at risk of infection, health authorities said. She was not named.

As of Friday more than 580 suspicious envelopes were handed over to the state-run Malbran Institute -- a leading medical research center where Argentina's 1984 Nobel-prize winner Cesar Milstein once worked as chief of molecular biology.

Governments around the world have become increasingly fearful that anthrax smeared on letters is being used as a biological weapon after some 40 people tested positive in the United States for exposure to the disease and one person died.

The head of intensive care at the Muniz Hospital, Jorge San Juan, told reporters on Friday that the envelope came from Miami and was from the Carnival Cruise Line. Health Minister Hector Lombardo later repeated that information on an investigative journalism television program.

A spokeswoman for Miami-based Carnival Corp. (NYSE:CCL - news), the world's largest cruise group, said on Saturday her company had not yet been contacted by Argentine authorities but that it appeared the contaminated envelope was mailed by a package tour company whose promotional material included cruises with Carnival.

(Additional reporting by Juan Bustamante.)

-- Anonymous, October 21, 2001