Saturday November 3 5:46 AM ET

New Anthrax Found in N.Y., Mo.

By PAUL RECER, AP Science Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - New patches of anthrax spores were confirmed at widely separated postal facilities - sorting machines in New York City and a stamp store in Kansas City, Mo. - and the number of anthrax infections from bioterrorism rose to 17.

Investigators reported little progress Friday in efforts to explain how a New York hospital worker, unconnected with mail-handling activities, contracted respiratory anthrax, a disease requiring contact with a large number of spores. Kathy T. Nguyen died of the disease this week.

A previously unexplained New Jersey case of skin anthrax was linked to a mail box, which officials said was ``a good sign'' because it fit the pattern of previous cases. But federal health experts warned the nation to expect more disease cases during the anthrax-by-mail crisis.

In Washington, Treasury Department officials isolated a suspicious letter and sent it for testing. The letter bore the same Trenton, N.J., postmark as anthrax-laced mail delivered in New York and Washington. Officials said the address was also handwritten. Similar envelopes were recovered from Sen. Tom Daschle's office in Washington and from Tom Brokaw's office at NBC.

``We have no indication that it is dangerous in any way, but we're having it tested,'' said Treasury Department spokeswoman Michele Davis.

Anthrax tests at the Morgan Processing and Distribution Center in Manhattan found evidence of bacteria spores on six mail-sorting machines and in a dust-removing machine. The plant processes 12.5 million pieces of mail daily. Officials of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended 60-day courses of antibiotics for some workers at the mail center.

In Kansas City, the Stamp Fulfillment Center was closed after the CDC confirmed discovery of two microscopic patches of anthrax spores on a trash container. Officials recommended 60 days of antibiotics for the center's 240 workers. The center received mail from Brentwood, a Washington postal center that processed an anthrax-laced envelope delivered to Daschle's office and where two postal workers died of anthrax.

The CDC said Friday that a New York Post employee became the nation's 17th confirmed case of anthrax since the bioterrorism crisis began last month. A skin lesion on the patient, who was not identified, had earlier been suspected as anthrax and tests confirmed the diagnosis.

Of the 17 cases, 10 people - including four who died - were diagnosed with respiratory anthrax, the most serious form of the disease. The other seven cases affect the skin.

Three additional cases were confirmed by New York health officials, including Mark Cunningham, an editorial page worker who is the third New York Post employee to be reported infected with anthrax. The three additional cases are not counted by the CDC, which uses different criteria.

All the cases have been linked to the mail except for Nguyen, a Manhattan hospital worker who died of inhaled anthrax before she could be interviewed. Investigators are questioning people who knew her in hopes of learning how she could have encountered the thousands of anthrax spores thought necessary to cause the disease.

Officials said investigating Nguyen's death was particularly important because her infection had no apparent connection with the postal system or mail handling. This raised the possibility that she contracted anthrax in a way different from the other 16 cases.

A similar mystery was solved for a New Jersey woman with skin anthrax when her mailbox tested positive for anthrax spores, suggesting her disease came from a contaminated letter.

``It's a good sign,'' Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Thompson warned, however, that there may be more contaminated letters and more cases of anthrax.

CDC officials announced that anthrax bacteria that killed Nguyen was of the same strain as the spores found in letters sent to Daschle and to the New York news outlets. This suggests that Nguyen was infected by spores that leaked from the known anthrax-laced letters.

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On the Net: White House anthrax page: http://www.whitehouse.gov/homeland/anthrax-faq.html

-- Anonymous, November 03, 2001