WASHINGTON, Oct 25: A new case of anthrax surfaced in the United States and another was suspected on Thursday as scientists gleaned new insight into the particularly lethal sample of the bio-terror bacteria sent to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle.

A worker at a facility handling mail bound for the State Department “tested positive” for anthrax and an employee at NBC News in New York was suspected of suffering from skin anthrax.

Two children were being treated in Washington for possible exposure to the anthrax bacteria and a female congressional reporter was undergoing preventative treatment.

Homeland Security Chief Tom Ridge meanwhile said that the sample of anthrax mailed to Daschle was more “concentrated, and therefore more lethal than some of the other specimens used in the bioterror attack.

“It is highly concentrated. It is pure, and the spores are smaller. Therefore, they’re more dangerous, because they can be more easily absorbed in a person’s respiratory system,” Ridge said at a White House briefing.

In comparison, anthrax sent to the New York Post was “more coarse and less concentrated than the anthrax in the Daschle letter,” he said.

It was still too early to say if a foreign state, group or individual had manufactured the anthrax, Ridge said : “the tests now give us very specific characteristics, the tests may or may not lead us to the source.”

The Washington Post earlier reported that only three nations, the United States, Russia and Iraq had access to the sophisticated technology needed to concentrate anthrax so that spores can linger in the air.

Two workers at a Washington mail depot have died from inhalation anthrax, it is believed after the Daschle letter passed through the facility. Two other workers are battling inhalation anthrax in hospital.

Sufficient residue of anthrax sent to NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw and to a Florida tabloid was not available to permit testing, Ridge said.

The case of the worker handling mail for the State Department means that up to 14 people have now been infected with anthrax in the United States. Three people have died.

“An employee who works at our main mail handling facility has tested positive for anthrax,” Boucher said, referring to the facility in Sterling, Virginia outside Washington.

“Where and how he was exposed is not known,” Boucher added. “He is currently hospitalized and has been treated.”

The New York health department said that another NBC News employee in New York had “probably” contracted skin anthrax, which is easier to cure than inhalation anthrax.—AFP