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American Morning
Officials Reopen Longworth House Office Building; CDC Says Group of People Vaccinated Against Smallpox
Aired November 05, 2001 - 10:15 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.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: I want to go back to Washington now, specifically Capitol Hill, where lawmakers take one small step closer to normalcy today. About two hours ago, officials reopened the Longworth House office building, 10 days after traces of anthrax were found in the offices of three lawmakers.
Kate Snow now watching that reopening there and following it as well.
Kate, good morning.
KATE SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Good morning, Bill.
A lot people in a good mood this morning about this.
Here is what they are receiving as they go back into the Longworth House office building.
Th headline, welcome back to Longworth. This goes on to tell people that no contaminated mail has been found in the Longworth building, and htat all of the unopened mail that they found as they were going through Longworth has been returned to a safe place with the FBI. Now staffers are told, if they find any additional unopened mail that makes them suspicious, they should put it in a ziplocked bag and give it immediately to the FBI.
Now every office inside the Longworth Building is open today, except for three. There are three offices on the 6th and 7th floors that were found to have slight traces of anthrax. Those three offices have been walled off essentially. There is plywood covering the doorways of those offices being Painted white to blend in with the rest of the area.
Those offices contained, again, only small traces. And authorities insist the rest of the building is perfectly safe to occupy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
uf Very excited to get back in the building, get back to work, have a normal schedule.
SNOW: Are you nervous now about going back in? uf Not at all.
I feel great. It's good to be back. They made the accommodations very great for us. We were in Rayburn in the GAO building. But it's good to be back with our own computers, and our own office and our own staff, full staff.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SNOW: Now most of the anthrax contamination on Capitol Hill was found on the Senate site of the campus here, in the Hart office building, which is where Senator Daschle's office is. That building remains closed this morning, and we have just gotten in touch with the EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, a spokeswoman telling us that they have begun using antibacterial foam inside the Hart building, to start decontaminating some of those areas where they found anthrax. This is happening as they wait to do the real big push to decontaminate the building, and that will involve chlorine dioxide gas. The EPA recommened that last week. They have been doing a peer review of that plan. We are told by the spokeswoman that that peer review came back yesterday.
The review, we're told, was favorable, but there was one concern about the size of the building and whether chlorine dioxide gas would be effective in a building that is one million cubic feet in size.
Bill, one thing to note, is this is the kind of project that has never been tried before on this scale, never been tried against anthrax. Authorities hoping if that if it works, though, it could be a model for how to decontaminate other areas around the country that have been found with anthrax spores.
Back to you.
HEMMER: Well, indeed.
Kate, I know you are not a scientist, but if they spray the foam, how long will it take to be effective, to work, to reopen things there?
SNOW: Well, the foam, I understand, is a rather quick and easy way to do it. But the concern about usign foam everywhere is that it is a little messy and it dose leave some traces mind, so they are not going to use that all over the building. That's why they were trying to use the chlorine dioxide gas, and that process will take about two weeks, sealing the buildings, putting the gas in, removing it, making sure all the gas is gone, and it's safe to go back inside the buidling. That will take about two weeks.
HEMMER: Coming up on Thanksgiving, how about then?
Kate, thanks. Kate Snow in Washington.
A quick look now at the breakdown of numbers now in the nationwide anthrax situation. The number of infection cases now stand at 17, including four who have died from inhalation anthrax,l and six others who are now being treated for that more serious form of the infection. Seven others have cutaneous on skin anthrax, and to date, there are 32 anthrax exposures cases, the less serious kind, here in the U.S.
Now the head for the CDC, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, says a group of people have been vaccinated against smallpox and the U.S. government is working to amass a small stockpile of smallpox vaccine.
Rhonda Rowland watching that story in Atlanta.
Rhonda, good morning.
RHONDA ROWLAND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Bill.
And as you said, some experts here at the CDC have been vaccinated against smallpox, and this is all part of their effort to prepare for a possible attack. So what they are also doing here at the CDC this week, is they are bringing out of retirement former CDC employees who were involved in the global eradication of smallpox back in the 1970s. So they will be instructing the current employees about this particular virus, how to recognize it, how to test for it. Also, how do administer the vaccine.
They currently, as you probably know, the CDC has a stockpile of 15 million dose of the vaccine. And there is a study now under way at four U.S. medical centers to see if they can stretch the vaccine stockpile.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
uf How are you doing.
uf I'm great.
ROWLAND (voice-over): Twenty-six-year-old Alison Hayes is the first person in the United States to be vaccinated against smallpox in a critical new study, a study designed to see if America's precious stockpile of smallpox vaccine can be stretched. Just 15 million doses of the freezed-dried vaccine exist today, not nearly enough to deal with a large outbreak of smallpox. The question is whether it can be diluted to make more doses and still protect people.
DR. SHARON FREY, LEAD INVESTIGATOR, ST. LOUIS UNIV.: We'll look at vaccine that is undilluted as a control, and then we'll dilute it five times, and then we'll dilute it 10 times, and we'll use those different strengths to vaccinate people, to see how often they have a response or a take to the vaccine.
ROWLAND: Another lingering question, is the 25-year-old Drivax (ph) vaccine, last manufactured by Wyeth Ayerst (ph) in 1981, still effective. It was answered in a small study of 60 people conducted earlier this year.
FREY: What we found was that the undiluted vaccine was just as good as ever. ROWLAND: Researchers will know if the vaccine works or takes in an individual if a characteristic scab forms at the injection site after six to 10 days. Study volunteers must be between the ages of 18 and 32 and healthy, because the vaccine can cause serious complications, and even death.
Routine childhood immunization against smallpox stopped in the U.S. in 1972. Over time, immunity wanes. For Alison Hayes, it was an easy decision to participate in the study.
ALISON HAYES, STUDY VOLUNTEER: I guess by participating in this study, it would have hopefully make the vaccination stretch so that we would have enough to give to everyone.
ROWLAND: Researchers hopes to know within several months if the old smallpox stockpile can be safely diluted.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, NIH: So we can say, not only do we have 15 million, we might have 75 million, or 150 million doses. That's something that's a very immediate partial solution to the problem to the shortage of the smallpox vaccine.
ROWLAND: The full solution is already in the works.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ROWLAND: That's right, health officials are right now working on a new second-generation vaccine. And in fact, government officials are talking to vaccine makers to see if they can come up with an additional 300 million vaccines so every American would have access to a smallpox vaccine if it's needed -- Bill.
HEMMER: All right, thanks. Rhonda Rowland at the CDC here.
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