November 3, 2001	Saturday	Shaba’an 16, 1422

WASHINGTON, Nov 2: Two cases of anthrax were reported on Friday in Germany as the United States, which suffered the first casualties from the potentially deadly bacteria, struggled to hunt down those responsible for the germ warfare attacks.

Two suspected cases of anthrax were reported in the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein and the eastern state of Thuringia.

Local health authorities in Thuringia said they had a strong suspicion of the first anthrax contamination in Germany. Almost immediately the regional government of Schleswig-Holstein reported a second suspected case.

As the anthrax scare swept the United States, the head of German drug maker Bayer AG defended his company’s decision not to give away for free its patented Cipro antibiotic.

Other companies have pledged free supplies of antibiotics known or claimed to be useful in treating anthrax but not all have been approved by US regulators for that purpose.

“They’re not approved for anthrax,” Bayer President and CEO Helge Wehmeier said on the NBC “Today” program. “If we were not approved for anthrax we would offer it (Cipro) for free as well,” he said.

In New York officials said the strain of anthrax bacteria that claimed the latest victim since the outbreak began nearly a month ago, was “indistinguishable” from the bacteria sent to a US senator and various media offices.

Investigators were seeking clues on how Kathy Nguyen, 61, encountered the bacteria that took her life, making her the fourth person in the United States to die in the past month after inhaling anthrax spores. The hospital stockroom employee died on Wednesday at a Manhattan hospital.

New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said in television interviews that he had no answers in the case.

“Numerous people are being interviewed, a great deal of evidence is being pursued but right now there is no clear picture as to exactly how she contracted it,” he said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

Reports of confirmed or suspected anthrax in Pakistan and Germany followed similar reports in Lithuanian where health officials on Wednesday confirmed anthrax had been found in a mail bag sent to the US Embassy in the capital Vilnius from the State Department in Washington.

It was the second US diplomatic mission, after Peru, to find the bacteria in mail sent from the State Department, one of several government buildings contaminated with anthrax.

The US Supreme Court building, which closed for a week after anthrax was found in a basement mailroom, was set to begin reopening on Friday. But anthrax contamination was found on Thursday in four US Food and Drug Administration mailrooms outside Washington.

The Bush administration appointed a leading bioterrorism expert to head a new office charged with coordinating the national response to public health emergencies, including the spate of attacks involving letters laced with the powdery anthrax spores.

The seeming match of the anthrax involved in the Nguyen case and in letters sent by unknown perpetrators to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle in Washington and media offices in Florida and New York could indicate the dangerous germs originated from the same source, officials believe.

Sixteen cases of anthrax have been confirmed in the United States during the current outbreak. Inhalational anthrax also killed a Florida tabloid newspaper photo editor and two Washington postal workers.

Police, the FBI and public health investigators have tested the hospital where Nguyen worked and the Bronx apartment where she lived, but have not yet found the source of her infection. What is confounding investigators is the fact she had no apparent connection to the government and media targets of the mailed anthrax attacks or mail handling.

Nasal swabs taken from 28 of Nguyen’s co-workers came back negative. Officials were awaiting results on tests of the hospital environment.

Preliminary tests did detect anthrax in the four FDA mailrooms in the buildings in Rockville, Maryland, north of Washington. People who worked in the mailrooms were being given antibiotics as a precautionary measure.

The FDA, which regulates pharmaceuticals, most foods, medical devices and other products, has closed all of its Rockville-area mailrooms until they can be decontaminated.

The US Supreme Court, however, said it would reopen in stages after tests found no further traces of anthrax.

The nation’s highest court closed its doors last week after finding anthrax in the basement mailroom. The court convened at a different location this week for the first time since 1935.

The court’s nine justices will return for oral arguments on Monday, although the building will remain closed to the public except for those attending the arguments.—Reuters