A fourth case of the potential germ warfare agent anthrax was discovered in the US on Friday and US Vice President Dick Cheney said there could be links between the cases and Osama bin Laden.
The latest report of anthrax exposure frayed already jittery nerves, a day after the FBI sent out a general warning to US citizens at home and abroad that there could be further attacks in retaliation for the US bombing of Afghanistan.
Hours after officials said an employee of NBC-TV's Nightly News program tested positive for skin anthrax, Cheney said in a TV interview that although there was not enough evidence to positively pin down a connection to the chief suspect in the Sept. 11 attacks on the US, the cases of anthrax in Florida and New York were "suspicious."
"I think the only responsible thing for us to do is proceed on the basis that it could be linked," Cheney said on PBS' NewsHour. He said the US had ample evidence that bin Laden's followers were trained in how to spread biological and chemical weapons.
The US Postal Service warned employees and customers to be careful when handling suspicious packages.
The NBC employee was the fourth case of confirmed exposure to the bacteria at a media company since last month's attack on America, prompting the US health system to go on alert for possible biological assault.
But fears that a letter received by New York Times journalist Judith Miller, co-author of a book on bioterrorism, at her office also contained anthrax receded after the company said on Friday night that white powder in the envelope tested negative for harmful bacteria.
The FBI said the envelopes sent to The New York Times on Friday and to NBC in late September were both postmarked St Petersburg, Florida, and included similar letters.
"These were addressed to the two media outlets, they were addressed to the individuals and we are not going to provide anything as to the actual contents of the letter," Barry Mawn, head of the FBI in New York, said at a news conference Friday. "There are some similarities between the two. I'm not going to tell what was said in the letters."
The skin anthrax afflicting the female employee of NBC TV was not as dangerous as the inhaled version of the anthrax bacteria that killed a 63-year-old employee of American Media Inc in Boca Raton, Florida, and was found in two other employees at the same company.
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