From the Telegraph.
We have got to get a grip on this.
Ed

Tuesday October 16, 7:42 PM

World gripped by anthrax panic as US cases rise

WASHINGTON, Oct 16 (AFP) -
The world was gripped with fear of bioterrorism on Tuesday, as anthrax cases in the United States rose and a spate of hoaxes, false alarms and unconfirmed attacks were reported elsewhere.

Fear was greatest in the United States, where a case in a seven-month-old boy brought the number of people infected by the disease to four and the bacteria was detected in a letter sent to Senate majority leader Tom Daschle.

While no anthrax cases have yet been confirmed outside America, fears that the US attacks on Afghanistan could provoke a terrorist backlash and reports of envelopes containing a mysterious white powder spread panic around the world.

The baby contracted an anthrax infection in his skin after visiting the offices of his father at ABC television in New York and is expected to survive after being treated with antibiotics.

Meanwhile a 73-year-old employee of American Media Inc. in Florida -- where the first fatal anthrax victim worked -- was found to have the more serious respiratory form.

A total of four people in the United States have now been confirmed to have had anthrax infections, while nine other people have been exposed to the bacterium but have not developed the illness. Of the four infected, one has died.

US Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson said it was clear that the people in the United States who were exposed to the bacteria were victims of bioterror.

President George W. Bush, announcing that anthrax had been detected in Daschle's office, said that he could not rule out that Osama bin Laden, the prime suspect behind September 11's attacks with hijacked planes on US cities, had launched a germ warfare attack on the United States.

"I wouldn't put it past him, but we have no hard evidence," he said.

Meanwhile the Austrian Post Office seized three letters containing white powder, one of which had been addressed to the Austrian public radio and television broadcaster ORF, interior ministry spokesman Rudolf Gollia said.

"There are no indications that it is the anthrax bacterium but we cannot totally exclude it," he said, adding that two of the letters carried the sender's address.

French police sealed off a post office just off Paris' Champs Elysees avenue, and a bank in the southwest of the city for tests after two more suspicious envelopes were found.

A day earlier 12 people were taken into hospital after letters containing powder were sent to a scientific institute and state financial offices, but tests of the substance and those exposed to it proved negative.

"There was nothing in those powders, that was confirmed last night," Health Minister Bernard Kouchner told France Inter radio. "There is no danger in our country, not a single confirmed case (of anthrax) at the moment."

A German government spokesman said Tuesday that a powder found in the mail room of Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's office had not contained the anthrax bacterium and had been sent for further analysis.

A large mail sorting office in the centre of Liverpool, northwest England, was evacuated Tuesday after white powder leaked out of a package.

Tests on three people in Britain who worked in the Florida and US offices at the centre of the scare and may have been exposed proved negative, Britain's public health laboratory service said.

A Finnish television company in Helsinki received a suspect letter on Tuesday containing an unidentified powder, the news agency STT/FNB said.

In Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Estonia government scientists are examining a spate of letters and parcels containing white powder, police said. Many of the letters were posted in Italy and at least one from South Korea, officials said.

South Korea announced Tuesday that it would install X-ray machines in post offices to protect against possible bioterrorist attacks, increase its stockpile of antibiotics and put a specialist team on 24-hour alert.

The US ambassador to Malaysia said US officials were working with the Kuala Lumpur government to investigate a letter that contained anthrax bacteria posted from Malaysia to a Microsoft office in Nevada.

Reports from the US said a letter containing a cheque, which had been sent by Microsoft to one of its vendors in Malaysia, was returned to the software giant's office in Carson City, Nevada, containing pornographic pictures.

It was tested and found positive for traces of anthrax, although no-one in Nevada was infected.

White powder found leaking from an envelope discovered at the central post office in Fukushima city, northern Japan, was not the deadly anthrax bacteria as originally feared, police said.

In Ottawa, a section of Canada's main Parliament building was evacuated and cordoned off after a suspicious package arrived. 35 people were taken to a detoxification unit but The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said there was no evidence the white powder contained anthrax.

A train was evacuated at the railway station in the northwestern Italian town of Sestri Levante after the discovery of a bottle containing a suspicious white liquid, Italian railway police said.

Unidentified powder suspected to contain anthrax spores was found on an Israeli cargo plane arriving from Europe, according to media reports.

Security agents were called and a sample of the material was sent to the Biological Institute in Nes Tsiona, south of Tel Aviv. It was not yet known if the substance contained anthrax spores.

Eleven people were undergoing tests for anthrax in Poland after opening letters containing a suspicious powder sent to a police office and a television station, officials said.

Brazil's defense ministry asked that a Lufthansa plane found carrying a suspicious white powder be grounded until laboratory tests could be conducted.

In Melbourne, Australia, US Consul General David Lyon said 40 consulate staff members were evacuated for 45 minutes after a letter found to have a suspicious chemical residue arrived at the office.

In Israel public health officials, police and soldiers rushed to investigate reports of the white powder at the offices of the daily Maariv, only to find that an office worker had confessed to sending a harmless substance as a joke.