More workers test positive

Up to 300 staff at a New York hospital are expected to undergo tests for anthrax today after a hospital worker fell seriously ill with a suspected case of the inhaled form of the disease.

Preliminary tests appear to reveal that the 61-year-old woman, who works in the stockroom at the Manhattan Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital, was positive, but New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani said the results would not be confirmed until later today. He said the woman was in a critical condition.

Health officials have already taken environmental samples from the hospital. Staff will be tested and given antibiotics as a precaution. Patients who have visited the hospital since 11 October, two weeks prior to the woman's onset of illness, will also be traced.

If confirmed to have the disease the woman, who does not normally handle mail but works close to the hospital's mailroom, would be only the second person not connected with the postal system or the media to contract anthrax. She would also be the first person in New York to contract the more serious inhaled version of anthrax.

The number hit by anthrax continues to rise, with suspicions now confirmed that a mail worker in New Jersey who had been treated for inhalation anthrax has the disease. The widening scale of the contamination came as it emerged that the White House is considering opening and photocopying all President George Bush's mail, including his personal letters, to eliminate the possibility that he might handle an anthrax-laced letter.

Evidence of contamination has already been found in the mailrooms of the government building that houses the Voice of America broadcasters and food and drug administration; the justice department's main building; the agriculture department mailroom; and three offices in Congress's Longworth House Building.