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Politics : Homeland Security -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: RocketMan who wrote (659)	11/27/2001 9:14:51 PM
From: Snowshoe	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 827

WSJ says that Chile letter was mailed from US, and that authorities are still somewhat skeptical about the anthrax... November 28, 2001 Possible Anthrax Letter Sent to Chile Came From New York, Company Says By JERRY MARKON, MARK SCHOOFS, RICK BROOKS and ROGER THUROW Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL A Swiss-postmarked letter sent to Chile that authorities say contained anthrax was actually mailed from New York, through a New York-based subsidiary of the Swiss Post office, company officials said Tuesday. The discovery seemed to rule out that a new foreign source of anthrax contamination had been found; all anthrax-contaminated letters found so far had originated in the U.S. Michael Knorr, director of Swiss Post International (USA Inc.), a wholesaler that handles overseas mail for about 30 U.S. businesses, said the letter "came through us." He said employees are being tested at a local clinic for anthrax exposure and that the company plans to test its facilities for the deadly bacterium. The letter, which bears the return address of a Florida publishing house, Mosby Inc., a unit of Reed Elsevier PLC, still breaks the previous patterns of anthrax letters because it was a business envelope sent overseas, wasn't handwritten and didn't go through any U.S. post offices. Mr. Knorr said the letter was dropped for mailing at Swiss Post's New York office by DHL Worldwide Express, the California-based shipping company that is a client of Swiss Post. Mosby is a client of DHL, Mr. Knorr said. Spokesmen for both Mosby and DHL said their companies were cooperating with the Federal Bureau of Investigation agents looking into the case. The pediatrician in Santiago, Chile, who received the letter says he became suspicious because the envelope bore a Zurich postmark and a Florida return address. But Mosby's overseas mailings are routinely sent by DHL through Swiss Post, which regularly sends mail overseas -- with a Zurich postmark -- for businesses that use it to save money. A Miami laboratory that tests suspected foreign cases of anthrax for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says a sample taken from the letter tested positive for anthrax. The CDC is conducting its own tests after receiving samples Tuesday. U.S. investigators say they haven't yet seen the envelope or letter. While the CDC publicly stands by the testing done by its Florida officials, at least one senior researcher in the agency's Atlanta headquarters cautioned that "it will be important to confirm that." If the sample proves to be anthrax, the researcher said, the CDC would want to make sure that it wasn't a result of laboratory contamination, a common problem in isolating and testing microbes. If it is confirmed as anthrax, the strain could be identified by Wednesday, and then the CDC can compare that strain with those that might have been present in the Chilean laboratory. The Chilean letter breaks so sharply from the pattern of the U.S. letters that "the index of suspicion is very high," the researcher said. Law-enforcement officials were also cautious, even while they pursued U.S. leads. One person close to the investigation said that "without the letter to actually test to see if there is any anthrax residue on it, we're not prepared to say for sure" that the Chilean letter is actually contaminated. The CDC didn't test the letter itself, but rather bacterial cultures that were obtained by swabbing the inside of the envelope and the letter, according to the CDC researcher. FBI officials in Washington said Tuesday that the agency hasn't opened a separate investigation yet into the Chile letter but was monitoring the situation, primarily to see how the anthrax strain might compare to the anthrax found in Boca Raton, Fla., New York City and in Washington. An FBI agent familiar with the investigation said if the CDC finds the strains are similar "then we'll get involved." Those results are expected soon. Meanwhile, investigators continued to test sites in Oxford, Conn., for anthrax Tuesday, taking environmental samples from a vacuum bag used by the cleaning service hired by 94-year-old Ottilie Lundgren, the most recent anthrax victim. Thus far, more than 1,000 environmental samples taken in Oxford have tested negative for anthrax. A review of recent deaths and illnesses in southwestern Connecticut has also so far failed to provide any insight into how Ms. Lundgren came into contact with anthrax. One man whose death appeared suspicious to investigators -- an 84-year-old in nearby Seymour who lived and died alone -- turns out to have died of heart and diabetes-related complications, according to an autopsy. Health officials are testing 15 people with "suspicious illnesses" across the state, but no information about those cases was available Tuesday. -- Maureen Tkacik contributed to this article. Write to Jerry Markon at jerry.markon@wsj.com1, Mark Schoofs at mark.schoofs@wsj.com2, Rick Brooks at rick.brooks@wsj.com3 and Roger Thurow at roger.thurow@wsj.com4 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- URL for this Article: interactive.wsj.com