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CNN Live At Daybreak

Anthrax Survivor Speaks Out

Aired August 02, 2002 - 06:06   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.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: We turn now to the anthrax investigation that's been going on since last fall. Some law enforcement authorities are calling former Army researcher, Steven Hatfill, a potential suspect in those deadly attacks. The FBI searched his Maryland apartment for the second time in two months yesterday.

Meanwhile, some of the anthrax victims are still recovering.

CNN's Rea Blakey spoke with one of them.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

REA BLAKEY, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The odds were against Leroy Richmond living to tell his story.

LEROY RICHMOND, ANTHRAX SURVIVOR: I was a victim of circumstance in the beginning.

BLAKEY: He was the first of four Washington, D.C. area postal workers diagnosed with inhalational anthrax.

RICHMOND: It is an amazement to me how two of my closest friends that I knew quite well got the anthrax bacteria and died, and myself and another person got the same effect from the bacteria and lived.

BLAKEY: Richmond spent 27 days in the hospital fighting for his life. Since then, he's been on sick leave. Ironically, when he was infected, he was on a clean-up detail.

RICHMOND: They knew the postmaster was coming that Thursday, OK, even though the Daschle letter had been found the week before.

BLAKEY: Richmond was infected after a mail sorting machine was cleaned with a high-pressure hose.

(on camera): A week and two days after the Daschle letter arrived, Mr. Richmond was hospitalized and diagnosed with inhalational anthrax. His wife, also a postal employee, called the troubling news in, but the Postal Service management was waiting on guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Unfortunately, the CDC itself was in uncharted territory at the time.

(voice-over): Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases:

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: What we learned from the mail service anthrax attack is that you've really got to look at the vulnerable people along the chain of exposure.

BLAKEY: Richmond returned with CNN to the Brentwood postal facility, where he was infected.

RICHMOND: I think the most important lesson to be learned is that you just can't take things for granted when you get a warning sign that people's lives could be endangered.

The shame of it is I'm a person who enjoyed going to work. I never, ever regretted getting out of my bed, driving an hour and 10 minutes and getting to work. I enjoy doing what I do, and a lot of people are not like that.

BLAKEY: Five people died in the U.S. from inhalational anthrax during the fall of 2001. Leroy Richmond beat the odds.

Rea Blakey, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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