Two Missing Anthrax Vials Found Mislabeled

TRENTON, N.J. -- Officials have found two missing vials of anthrax mislabeled at a state lab among the samples taken from the postal facility that processed tainted letters in 2001.

There was a transcription error in the numbers when they were labeled, state epidemiologist Eddy Bresnitz said.

Officials disclosed they had lost track of the vials nearly two weeks ago. Officials said they thought it was a clerical error and that no anthrax was actually lost.

The anthrax vials were among 19,000 samples gathered at the Hamilton Township postal facility that handled some anthrax-laced letters soon after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Five people were killed and 17 were sickened, including five postal workers.

Am I the only one who thinks anyone who mis-labels anthrax should be fired; then investigated thoroughly?

"Oversights" of a certain nature must always be viewed with suspicion. Some topics leave no room for incompetence.

Am I the only one who thinks anyone who mis-labels anthrax should be fired; then investigated thoroughly?

Agree but this rarely happens with public employees. Even if a public employee if determined to be at fault a real penalty is even rarer.

It says transcription......it does NOT say transposition. Slight difference.

I am the eyewitness to the incident where there was a transposition of two numbers on a label. An innocent woman had that address and the post office delivered the package. She opened it without looking at the label. One week later she showed me an anthrax-like sore that dripped a great deal. She said her husband and the same thing on his face. Eight days later, I also saw the husbands sore. He was dripping so profusely that he was constantly mopping his chin as his was on his face.

Now if you read the pre-9-11 literature you will be convinced that anthrax is not a weeping lesion, but the CDC reports show that the mailed anthrax dripped and dripped like a faucet....see Judith Miller's book GERMS p. 315.

There is a slightly different genetic makeup with the mailed kind. And they even know where it is...it is on the plasmid, the island of pathogenicity, and it is an inversion in the base pairs. I have heard reports that you can actually see fluted edges in the petri dishes of the kind that is mutated. Fluted edges....would that mean that it is leaking into the media???

Nevertheless, I was interview by three federal agents and they know what I know and I think they are on it!!! Any minute that should.........hopefully catch him.

"Thank goodness they weren't labeled "salt" or someone might have sprinkled a little on their french fries at lunch."
Once, ages ago, I saw a salt shaker made out of small empty [but properly labeled, with crossbones and all] potassium cyanide bottle - they drilled a few small holes in the lid. It was a conversation piece.

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