- BOCA RATON, Florida (CNN)
-- State and local health officials on Sunday closed down the building
in which a 63-year-old Florida man who died of anthrax worked, after a
sample from the building and from another employee showed the presence
of the bacterium that causes anthrax.
-
- Authorities closed the American Media Inc. building and
the company voluntarily evacuated employees who were there working Sunday
evening, said a spokeswoman for the Palm Beach County Emergency Management
Office.
-
- Robert Stevens, a photographer for a newspaper with
offices
in that building, died Friday of inhalation anthrax. He checked into the
JFK Medical Center in Atlantis, Florida, on Tuesday.
-
- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in
Atlanta,
Georgia, is heading the investigation into how Stevens contracted the
disease.
A statement from the CDC said that Bacillis anthracis, the bacterium that
causes anthrax, was found in the nasal sample of another man who worked
in the building. The man does not have anthrax, but the presence of the
bacterium shows he has been exposed to the disease.
-
- An environmental sample taken from inside the building
has also shown the presence of Bacillis anthracis, but the results from
several other samples taken will not be available for several days, the
CDC statement said.
-
- The emergency management spokeswoman said the samples
included air samples.
-
- The CDC said the current risk of workers or visitors
to the building contracting anthrax is extremely low, but public health
officials have begun to contact personnel who worked in the building since
August 1 to give them preventative antibiotics. Such antibiotics given
before the symptoms of anthrax appear can prevent the disease.
-
- Health officials stressed that the disease is not
contagious
from one person to another.
-
- Stevens fell ill after a recent trip to North Carolina,
but a Florida state epidemiologist said he did not believe Stevens
contracted
the disease during his trip because the incubation period for anthrax is
between six and 45 days, a period which would not have included his
trip.
-
- Anthrax -- considered to be a potential agent for use
in biological warfare -- is caused by the spore-forming bacterium Bacillus
anthracis and most commonly occurs in cattle, sheep, goats, and other
herbivores.
Humans can become infected when they are exposed to infected animals or
tissue from infected animals.
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