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CNN Saturday Morning News

Many Americans are Fearful of Further Terrorist Attacks

Aired October 27, 2001 - 07:25   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: New Yorkers boast -- or bore most of the horror in the terrorist attacks on the nation, but people all over the nation were stunned and saddened. Some were terrified, and they're still scared.

CNN's Anne McDermott has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANNE MCDERMOTT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There are monsters out there. We know that. What we don't know is, when will they come and kill again?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Every time I hear a plane overhead, it sounds too close.

MCDERMOTT: Terror is taking its toll on some of us, maybe because you can't escape what it's done to us -- the metal detectors at work, the plane delays due to anthrax scares, and day after day, bad news, worse news.

BARRY GLASSNER, SOCIOLOGIST: People just have the sense that there's all kinds of disasters waiting to happen, and anything can happen next.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, when you're in the subway, which I just came from, you know, you don't know if something's going to happen and it's going to cave in on you.

MCDERMOTT: Not so long ago, an earlier generation of Americans ducked and covered because they were afraid of this. And some of the fearful even built themselves a bomb shelter. Today, some find comfort in constructing what they call safe rooms stocked with food and water and...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: These cans would be the rest room.

MCDERMOTT: It helps, she says, to do something.

But most won't do this, just as most people aren't stockpiling anti-anthrax drugs. This southern California woman thought about it, but...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I can't go that direction with my crazy mind. I kind of have to not even -- I just have to not think about it.

MCDERMOTT: But some cannot stop thinking about it. Some are frozen with fear.

EVELYN COHAN, PSYCHOLOGIST: They sleep a lot. They just find that they can't get up and do their day.

MCDERMOTT: This woman can. She goes to work, she acts perfectly normal, and is secretly scared.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I feel I'm on the verge of tears a lot of the time.

MCDERMOTT: Because she knows the monsters are still out there, and she doesn't know when they will go away.

Anne McDermott, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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