Hundreds of people in Florida are waiting for the results of tests for the bacteria, anthrax, after a fatal outbreak in the state. However, it is not now thought to be an act of terrorism. The FBI is still examining a tabloid newspaper office, American Media, where one worker died and another was hospitalised after being exposed to the disease.
Robert Stevens, a photo editor for AMI publication the Sun, died on Friday of a rare form of anthrax. A second man, mailroom employee Ernesto Blanco, has been exposed to the disease but has not contracted it. He is now in a Miami hospital.
Florida health officials are yet to determine if the anthrax strain was natural or engineered. Once this is established, it will be much easier to decide if the contamination was a criminal act.
Health Department officials and the FBI say that they are not ruling out the possibility of criminal involvement, but stress that they must find the source first.
Palm Beach County tested about 850 AMI employees and others who had worked in or visited the building, as well as their relatives. As the scare spreads throughout the country, authorities have isolated and treated some people in Washington, Kentucky and Virginia.
