- This is very odd. Someone must have a good idea
that this is where the US letter anthrax came from. Otherwise, why aren't
other labs destroying their anthrax supplies? Something is strange
here...
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- Patricia
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- Iowa State University Destroys Its Anthrax
-
Cites 'Extreme Concern'
- By Susan Lilly
- CNN Medical Unit
- 11-11-1
-
- AMES, Iowa (CNN) - Iowa State
University destroyed its anthrax sample last month because of concerns
over security in the wake of tainted letters that have apparently infected
17 people.
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- The sample, a strain that dated to the 1920s, was
destroyed
October 11 after "extensive consultation with proper officials,"
including the FBI, a university spokesman told CNN Friday.
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- University officials also consulted with the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention on whether it was a one-of-a-kind
sample,
the spokesman said. Assured it was not, the university decided to destroy
it because of the "extreme concern over the whole anthrax issue,"
the spokesman said.
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- It was destroyed in an autoclave, a device similar to
a sophisticated pressure cooker, and was then incinerated.
-
- When the anthrax scare began last month, the governor
of Iowa increased security at state labs that had anthrax, according to
the university spokesman. While a University of Iowa lab had the National
Guard at its lab, Iowa State University had one state trooper, the
spokesman
said.
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- The University of Iowa has no plans to destroy its
sample,
which the lab's director described as a "vaccine strain," that
is far less virulent than others.
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- "It's not really dangerous to a human being,"
said Dr. Mary Gilchrist, director of the lab in Iowa City. Gilchrist said
security had been beefed up at the lab, including the temporary use of
National Guard troops and a new lock system.
-
- ___
-
- US Anthrax Found To Have Come From
Ames, Iowa Research Center
- By Nicholas M. Horrock
Chief White House Correspondent
10-26-1
-
- WASHINGTON (UPI) - White
House spokesman Ari Fleischer said Friday the anthrax found in a letter
delivered to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-.S.D., could be produced
"by a PhD. microbiologist in a sophisticated laboratory," but
the findings did not rule out that bacteria was "state
sponsored."
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- For a week what is known about the nature and source
of the anthrax now discovered in the three areas, Florida, New York and
Washington has been a subject of hot debate in government. Published
reports
have suggested that the anthrax delivered to Daschle's office was
"weaponized"
and thus likely to have come from one of the nations like Iraq, Russian
and the U.S., which has produced anthrax in forms for use by military
forces.
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- Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge has refused to use
the term "weaponized" in favor of sticking to what government
scientists say about the anthrax. On Thursday, Major General John Parker,
the commander of the Army's U.S. Medical Research and Material Command,
said the three samples, from New York, Washington and Florida, "are
all from the same family or strain."
-
- He later added that the strain is "Ames." The
name was applied in 1980 by Army research scientists to a strain that was
shipped from the National Veterinary Services Laboratories at Ames,
Iowa.
-
- The College of Veterinary Medicine at Iowa State
University
said Thursday that it had destroyed its store of anthrax because of
concerns
arising out of the Sept. 11th attacks. The anthrax was produced for
agricultural
experimentation and had been kept under tight security the university said.
Parker said that the strain does not imply that the Daschle anthrax was
produced in Iowa and it could come from anywhere.
-
- ___
-
- Patricia A. Doyle, PhD
- Please visit my "Emerging Diseases" message
board at:
- http://www.clickitnews.com/emergingdiseases/index.shtml
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