Smallpox:  Connecticut Smallpox Plan Revised After Low Turnout

After a volunteer turnout that has been much lower than expected, Connecticut is reshaping its smallpox immunization plan, according to a state health official (see GSN, Feb. 6).

Connecticut officials originally planned to vaccinate 6,000 medical personnel by spring, but only 1,000 health care workers have volunteered, according to Christopher Cannon, an organizer of the state’s smallpox response plan.  By Tuesday, only 20 people had been immunized in the state, the Associated Press reported.

Officials originally intended to seek volunteers from 32 hospitals, but the effort might now expand to other medical facilities in the state, Cannon said.

“The good news is that every hospital in the state has agreed to participate,” said Cannon, who is a director at the Yale-New Haven Health System’s Office of Emergency Preparedness.

Nationwide, 1,043 people had been immunized as of yesterday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Associated Press/Newsday, Feb. 12).

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Anthrax:  British Troops Refuse Vaccine

More than half of the British military personnel stationed in the Persian Gulf region have refused to be vaccinated against anthrax, the London Guardian reported today (see GSN, Oct. 23, 2002).

Of 16,500 personnel offered the anthrax vaccination, only 8,103 have accepted, according to British Junior Defense Minister Lewis Moonie.  While the vaccination is voluntary, service personnel are strongly recommended to receive it, according to the Guardian.

The lack of full vaccination in military units could have an adverse effect on operations, according to British defense officials (Richard Norton-Taylor, London Guardian, Feb, 12).

Australian Sailors Shipped Home

Meanwhile, 11 Australian sailors on a ship destined for the Middle East have been sent back home after refusing to accept the anthrax vaccine, Australian Defense chief Gen. Peter Cosgrove told an Australian Senate committee hearing today.  There are still a number of sailors determining whether to be vaccinated, Cosgrove said, adding that a deadline for their decision appears necessary.

“The practical end point would be based around scheduled aircraft services to move them in a timely way out of the theatre ... and the need to send replacements,” Cosgrove said (Sydney Morning Herald, Feb. 12).

For further information, see:

CDC Frequently Asked Questions About Anthrax

Journal of the American Medical Association Background on Anthrax

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Smallpox:  France Plans to Immunize 150 Emergency Workers

France will immunize 150 volunteers with the smallpox vaccine, according to French Health Minister Jean-Francois Mattei.

“All specialists on bioterrorism in contact with international health authorities and intelligence services agree that smallpox is one of the most serious threats, even if the likelihood is weak,” Mattei said.

Volunteers will include nurses, doctors, police and justice personnel, the Associated Press reported.

French officials have ruled out a nationwide vaccination plan because of concerns over the dangers of the vaccine.  Mattei said that France is “almost finished” acquiring 70 million doses of the vaccine to immunize the country’s population of 61.4 million people in an emergency.

The 150 volunteers must have already received the vaccine when immunizations were standard, he added (Associated Press, Feb. 12).

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Anthrax:  U.S. Media Outlets, Embassy, Receive Potential Hoaxes

Employees at two U.S. media outlets in New York, ABC News and the Manhattan offices of ESPN, have received potential anthrax hoax letters, according to reports today (see GSN, Oct. 18, 2002).

An ABC News employee is currently undergoing treatment after opening an envelope that contained a suspicious white powder, according to sources.  “It has not been confirmed it was anything definite,” an ABC staff member said yesterday (Agence France-Presse/Yahoo.com, Feb. 11).

An ESPN marketing executive received a threatening letter containing a white powder yesterday, according to the New York Post.  The handwritten letter, which criticized an ESPN advertisement and was mailed from New York, contained a note saying, “Just dance,” police said (Larry Celona, New York Post, Feb. 11).  

The executive was taken to Roosevelt Hospital, but displayed no symptoms of illness, police said.  Samples recovered from the letter have been sent to the New York municipal health department for further analysis, according to the New York Daily News.  Sources said, however, that the letter appeared to be a hoax (New York Daily News, Feb. 11).

U.S. Embassy Scare

Meanwhile, an official at the U.S. Embassy in Brunei opened what was later revealed to be an anthrax hoax letter, officials said today.  Chief of Mission Robert Pons discovered Sunday an envelope marked “Anthrax” and containing a white powder inside a second envelope, according to Agence France-Presse.  The powder was later determined to be harmless.

Whoever sent the hoax “made it clear that he wanted us to believe the white powder contained anthrax,” said U.S. Ambassador Gene Christy, according to the Borneo Bulletin (Agence France-Presse/The Straits Times, Feb. 11).

For further information, see:

CDC Frequently Asked Questions About Anthrax

FBI Amerithrax Investigation

Journal of the American Medical Association Background on Anthrax

GSN Anthrax Attack Chronology (Dec. 12, 2001)

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Anthrax:  Former U.S. Biological Weapons Laboratory Due for Destruction

The U.S. National Cancer Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health, plans to tear down a former U.S. offensive biological weapons laboratory located at Fort Detrick, Md., the Washington Post reported yesterday (see GSN, Oct. 16, 2002).

The laboratory, Building 470, has been unoccupied since 1969 and was officially decommissioned in 1971.  Before then, however, the facility was used to produce biological agents, such as anthrax, for the U.S. offensive biological warfare program, according to the Post. 

The National Cancer Institute, which took over Building 470 in 1988, plans to tear down the building because it has been found to be structurally unsound.  Officials said there is little risk that the building’s demolition will release any biological agents.

“Since 1971, people have been going into that building,” said George Anderson, a decontamination expert with Southern Research Institute.  “There is no evidence of any viable, living (anthrax) spores in the building,” he said (David Snyder, Washington Post, Feb. 9).

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Anthrax:  Hatfill Manuscript Prompted FBI Forest Searches

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — The FBI’s recent searches of a forest near Frederick, Md., were inspired partly by a manuscript confiscated from Steven Hatfill, a former U.S. Army biologist who has been the public focus of the bureau’s investigation into the autumn 2001 anthrax attacks, a former U.N. weapons inspector who has sources involved with the investigation told Global Security Newswire last week (see GSN, Feb. 3).

The FBI has conducted two searches of the area, one in December and one last month.  Both searches used divers to search a number of ponds in the area, according to reports.  The search of the area was inspired by a section of a bioterrorism-related manuscript recovered from Hatfill’s apartment last year, said the former U.N. inspector, citing a confidential source.  A section in Hatfill’s manuscript mentioned terrorists dumping equipment into ponds similar to those investigated during the December search, he said.

The scene in Hatfill’s manuscript probably did not contain any sinister connotations, the former inspector said, adding the similarities were likely not intentional.

“In my mind this would not be unusual,” the former inspector said in a written response to GSN.  “One usually writes about what one is familiar with and this would include descriptive areas,” he added.

The FBI’s use of Hatfill’s manuscript as an inspiration for new tactics in its investigation, which has progressed for more than 1 1/2 years without notable results, could indicate a sense of desperation, the former inspector said.  “If the FBI is desperate, then anything might be beaten to death,” he added.

The FBI refused to comment on the searches, the motives behind them, or what, if anything, was found, citing that the investigation was still in progress.

The former inspector said he believed Hatfill is being “railroaded” by the FBI, which is ignoring other sources.

“It appears that the FBI has decided he is the one and now are concentrating all their efforts to find the evidence,” the former inspector said.  “They are barking up the wrong tree,” he added.

As the FBI continues its efforts to find the person or persons responsible for the anthrax attacks, Hatfill currently lives in limbo — sitting “in his girlfriend’s apartment making fruitless calls looking for employment” and “watching CNN,” said Patrick Clawson, Hatfill’s personal friend and spokesman.

Clawson said that neither he nor Hatfill knew why the FBI had conducted two searches of the section of forest near Frederick and the ponds contained within. 

“We don’t know why the FBI is searching those ponds ... but they can keep doing it,” Clawson said, professing Hatfill’s complete innocence in the attacks.  The “FBI can keep looking till hell freezes over,” he added.

The FBI might have intended the searches to be only a publicity stunt, Clawson said.  They were just to fool “the American public that Johnny G-Man was on the job,” he said.

For further information, see:

CDC Frequently Asked Questions About Anthrax

FBI Amerithrax Investigation

Journal of the American Medical Association Background on Anthrax

GSN Anthrax Attack Chronology (Dec. 12, 2001)

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Smallpox:  No Specific Goal For Smallpox Vaccinations, CDC Says

Faced with fewer than the expected number of volunteers to receive the smallpox vaccination, a top U.S. health official said yesterday the purpose of the national vaccination campaign is to ensure preparedness, not to immunize a particular number of medical personnel (see GSN, Feb. 6).

“Our goal is not achievement of a number.  Our goal is achievement of a preparedness capacity,” said Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  “We want the state and local health jurisdictions to implement this program as fast as they can but more importantly, as safely as they can,” she added.

Compensation for those sickened by the vaccine remains a contentious point, but the White House is getting “closer and closer” to offering a solution, Gerberding said (Laura Meckler, Associated Press/Los Angeles Daily News, Feb. 7).

“We recognize that concerns about compensation are causing people to be slow to volunteer because they’re afraid they’ll fall through the cracks,” she added.

Despite the fact that 250,000 doses of the vaccine have been sent to 41 states, only 687 volunteers in 16 states have received the vaccine, according to the CDC.

The program is “still very much in the early stages,” White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.  “We are confident that more than enough health care workers will answer the call so that we are prepared to respond to protect our fellow Americans in the event of any attack,” he said (Donald McNeil, New York Times, Feb. 7).

Gerberding said that there is a “basement” number of immunized personnel for the United States to be prepared for a bioterrorism attack but she did not say what that number is, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported today.

“We do not have a target number of people to vaccinate.  What we have is the targeted capacity to protect the American people,” Gerberding said (Marie McCullough, Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 7).

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U.S. Response:  Laboratories Not Prepared to Analyze Chemicals

U.S. public health laboratories are not prepared to handle many dangerous chemical weapons agents, according to a study released yesterday by the Association of Public Health Laboratories (see GSN, Jan. 24).

“We have almost nothing in place if an event occurred tomorrow,” said Scott Becker, the association’s executive director.

Despite extensive efforts to upgrade equipment, personnel and security, many laboratories do not have the capability to identify some of the most dangerous agents, according to the report.  On a 10-point scale to measure chemical response capability, 37 laboratories rated themselves at a four or below and nine laboratories rated themselves at a five or six.  Only eight of the facilities indicated that they have chemical response plans.

“The big fear in the lab community is the unknown sample somebody cooked up that may contain multiple agents,” said Jim Pearson, director of Virginia’s division of consolidated laboratory services.  “You could have a powder that somebody says is anthrax, and here it’s some chemical agent that blisters.  It affects your staff and puts you out of business,” he added.

State officials said that in the case of a suspicious illness or a mysterious gas, they would be forced to wait for results from a laboratory, the Washington Post reported.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has given money to five states to test clinical samples in the case of an attack, the Post reported.  Officials hope to extend that plan to 10 more states, according to Dayton Miller, associate director of the laboratory division at the CDC’s National Center for Environmental Health (Ceci Connolly, Washington Post, Feb. 7).

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