Posted by Mitchell on October 24, 2001, at 22:25:26
In reply to Could it be Anthrax?, posted by bboal on October 24, 2001, at 0:28:58
The elements of your situation that indicate against coetaneous anthrax seem to be the secondary glandular involvement, even while on antibiotics, and the time of onset in relation to the spread of anthrax spores in recent criminal enterprises. The first reported cases resulted from letters addressed in late September.
However, information about the criminal enterprise is incomplete. The known scope of exposure has expanded each day since the first reported fatality. Most recently, USPS mail processing equipment shipped to a repair facility has been found to be contaminated with bacillus anthracis spores of < 10 microns. If exposed to these rare spores manufactured for use as weapons, it is easy for a person to become infected.
The few thousand spores needed to cause pulmonary anthrax infection are, together, smaller than a speck of dust. With the amount of anthrax now known to have been distributed, undiscovered secondary spread of spores sufficient to cause coetaneous anthrax can be assumed. A letter that laid against a weaponized piece of mail, or that passed through the same mail handling equipment could then carry the spores. For this reason, the US Postal Service is now encouraging everyone to wash their hands after handling mail.
In such an uncertain time as this, you are not at all paranoid to wonder whether you might have been exposed. Prophylactic use of antibiotics might be misguided, but prophylactic testing for anthrax exposure is your right. Not only is it important for your mental health, it could be important to everyone's health and safety if it in some way contributes to the investigation and containment of this criminal activity. If your doctor will not provide the test, contact your local health department. If your local health department refuses, contact your state health department. If that does not produce results, please contact a public forum, such as you have done here, or other more conventional media outlets.
poster:Mitchell
thread:82142
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20011015/msgs/82234.html