Reading the entire chapter on vaccines, the RAC report does a fairly good job of reviewing the evidence (with a few notable omissions) and its recommendations are sound: from page 125 of the report: Recent studies have indicated that the current anthrax vaccine is associated with high rates of acute adverse reactions, particularly in women….

A major report on Gulf War Illness written by the VA Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans’ Illnesses (RAC) was made public on November 17. This is the most important document yet produced on Gulf War illnesses. About 1800 references are cited. The report gets it right about how many have developed the syndrome…

“Bruce Ivins was a cold-blooded murderer, a deranged psycho-killer, who in the fall of 2001, cooked up a virulent batch of powdered anthrax, drove to Princeton, N.J., and mailed letters loaded with the lethal mix to five news organizations and two U.S. senators. At least, that’s what the FBI says. The letters infected 22 people,…

Justin Palk, Frederick News-Post http://www.fredericknewspost.com/sections/archives/fnp_display.htm?storyID=88347 From World War II through 1975, thousands of service members and veterans were potentially exposed to chemical or biological weapons as subjects or observers of tests carried out by the Department of Defense. The department unveiled a new website Monday to provide information about what happened during those tests. The…

October 2008 Dear Representative ——–, I am writing with concerns about a liability shield just issued for anthrax vaccine, a huge new waste of government funds in anthrax vaccine purchases by DHHS, and expansion of anthrax vaccinations to civilian first responders, which is poised to begin after a CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP)…

From Judith Miller, let go from the NY Times for her poorly sourced, Iraq war drumbeat articles, who is now at Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, writing in their City Journal (reprinted by FrontPageMag.com): a long and valuable piece on the biodefense enterprise that has developed since 9/11. It includes the following: Moreover, while there…

Susannah Cahalan’s NY Post story provides a needed counterpoint to last week’s Washington Post puff piece on the Bruce Ivins case. Who would have expected to find higher journalistic standards at the NY Post than at its Washington namesake? New information in this story includes the fact that the FBI was renting the house next…

Today’s front page Washington Post article by Joby Warrick on the Ivins case appears to present the FBI’s side of the story. I will post excerpts from the article and comment (in italics) on its inconsistencies. Abshire focused her lens on a moldlike clump. Anthrax bacteria were growing here, but some of the cells were…

Robert Roos News Editor Oct 23, 2008 (CIDRAP News) – The federal Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) has opened the door to voluntary anthrax vaccination for first responders, revising an 8-year-old recommendation against that step. The committee, meeting yesterday, said the risk of anthrax exposure for emergency responders is low but “may not be…

CDC published a report October 1 on its very expensive, 43 month-long trial of anthrax vaccine, but inexplicably discussed only the first 7 months and only 65% of the subjects. No explanation was given for why only partial data were provided in this important paper. Bloomberg may provide the reason; the selected data discussed in…

Representative Rush Holt, Chairman of the House Select Intelligence Oversight Panel of the House Committee on Appropriations, and a Representative whose constituents were directly affected by the anthrax attacks, has requested that the National Academy of Science also answer the following questions, should it elect to undertake an independent review of the FBI’s scientific methods…

The Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act, also known as Division C of P.L. 109-148 (2005) limits liability with respect to pandemic flu and other public health countermeasures. A Congressional Research Service Report for Congress by Henry Cohen, Legislative Attorney notes the following: 1. The ONLY circumstance in which a shielded person could be held…

Mayur Pahilajani – iStockAnalyst WriterNew York, NY Shares of Emergent Biosolutions Inc (NYSE: EBS) topped 52-week mark after the bell on Friday as investors gained confidence in the company after the Rockville-based biotech’s profitable anthrax treatments won emergency protection. On October 9, the firm announced that the vaccine Biothrax and its Anthrax Immune Globulin, both…

Fri, Oct. 17, 2008 By ALAN BAVLEY The Kansas City Star Sure, the economy is causing a crisis, but what about anthrax? How about smallpox? In a little noticed move, federal officials this month have declared a series of public health emergencies relating to potential weapons of biological terror. On Oct. 1, Health and Human…

Elaine GrossmanGlobal Security Newswire Oct. 17, 2008WASHINGTON – The U.S. Health and Human Services Department early this month moved to shield government, industry and business officials from lawsuits filed by those who have received the anthrax vaccine (see GSN , Sept. 5, 2007). Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt established legal immunity for public…

In a particularly Kafka-esque memorandum, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chertoff wrote to Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt on September 23, 2008 and said bluntly that he had no evidence for an anthrax emergency… however, there exists a non-negligible risk there may someday be one, so feel free to invoke the…

October 23, 2007: GAO says HHS has announced that it will issue another rPA anthrax vaccine proposal but has not formally reviewed what went wrong with the VaxGen contract. “They may repeat their mistakes in the absence of a corrective plan,” the report says.

Elaine GrossmanGlobal Security Newswire: Oct. 16, 2008 WASHINGTON – A U.S. government advisory panel next week could recommend that state and local public health officials consider administering anthrax vaccines to as many as 3 million first responders nationwide, Global Security Newswire has learned. The panel, convened by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, would…

Excerpts from Wired Blog: The emergency was declared earlier this month by the Department of Health and Human Services, and will last until 2015. Whether it will protect public health is debatable, but it will certainly protect makers of faulty anthrax vaccines. The act is supposed to be invoked when the Secretary of Homeland Security…

The Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act (PREPA), passed by the United States Congress and signed into law in December, 2005, is a controversial tort liability shield intended to protect vaccine manufacturers from financial risk in the event of a declared public health emergency. The Act does not specify any criteria for determining the existence…

This week DHHS contracted to buy 14.5 million more doses of EBS’ anthrax vaccine. It has already purchased about 25 million doses for a civilian stockpile. This supply may be where the vaccine for first responders will come from. GAO reported in 2007 on the large losses DHHS will incur when the anthrax vaccine outdates;…

The October 3 article by Yudhijit Bhattacharjee (below) discusses the FBI’s request to NAS. How can the National Academy of Sciences answer whether the scientific work would meet evidentiary standards in a court of law? They are scientists, not lawyers. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has provided the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS)…

1. Omitting one dose, and injecting the vaccine deeper into muscle was widely reported to reduce adverse effects. But only brief local reactions at the skin are reduced, as one might expect with a deeper shot. The occurrence of the more consequential systemic adverse events was “not significantly influence[d]” by route of administration. 2. Women…

Thanks to Marisa Taylor at McClatchy Newspapers for this well-researched report on where the release of the records stands, and how the FBI justifies withholding these records.

Nature discusses weaponization and silicon, but not much new yet.

A letter published in the Journal of Environmental and Occupational Medicine, April 2004 described two lab workers using standard procedures to grow and handle anthrax at USAMRIID. Despite this, medium leaked from a flask and spores were recovered from the nares of one of the workers. The potential for inhalation anthrax was considered serious, and…

Following two dissatisfying Congressional hearings on the anthrax letters, and in the 110th Congress’ final week, Congressman Rush Holt filed HR 7049 as a shot across the bow: he is serious about getting to the bottom of the anthrax letter attacks. The 111th Congress will have to pick up this ball and run with it,…

The Washington Post reports on $113.6 million in government contracts to develop new anthrax vaccines. Two rival biotechs — Emergent BioSolutions of Rockville and PharmAthene of Annapolis — announced yesterday that they received separate federal development contracts. This is further evidence that, despite a $448 million contract landed by Emergent to supply 18.75 million doses…

Here is the FBI letter to NAS with a list of questions for NAS to address. Perhaps of interest, it is dated September 15, the day before the first Congressional hearing, but fails to commit to the study financially until October. NAS was not aware of the FBI’s interest in moving forward until Director Mueller…

A judge unsealed a new batch of court documents in the anthrax case on Wednesday, at http://www.usdoj.gov/amerithrax/

USA Today: The FBI never examined anthrax samples from the 2001 contamination event at (Ivins’) biodefense lab, which he allegedly covered up after the anthrax mailings. Yet these samples should have been the first to examine once Ivins was deemed a suspect.

1. I agree with all scientific conclusions [of the Analytical Chemistry article] except for the one that the silicon in the spore coat excludes its artificial origin. Sandia people think about the exosporium as an absolute barrier for small molecules but it is a diffuse, loosely-bound, and permeable layer. We can think about the spores…

News article from the journal Analytical Chemistry

Article by Scott Shane September 23, 2008 WASHINGTON — Congressional critics of the F.B.I.’s anthrax investigation are seeking an independent review of the seven-year inquiry to assess the bureau’s performance and its conclusion that an Army scientist, Bruce E. Ivins, carried out the 2001 attacks alone. Rush D. Holt, Democrat of New Jersey, would create…

Editorial from the The New York Post, reprinted in the Troy, NY Record: The often-partisan Democratic-run Congress has found a worthy target for the legislative branch’s constitutional oversight responsibilities: The FBI anthrax investigations. The House Judiciary Committee notified FBI Director Robert Mueller that oversight hearings will focus on the bureau’s investigation of Dr. Bruce Ivins…

SUN EDITORIAL: Overcoming Anthrax Doubts: Panel that will review government investigation of attacks must be independent (September 20, 2008) The FBI, the U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., and postal inspectors did not convince everyone last month when they laid out their case against the late Army microbiologist Dr. Bruce Ivins. Ivins, they said with surety,…

Scientific American today posted an article on the Sandia anthrax investigation performed by materials scientists. I’m not sure how much it adds to the weaponization discussion, and it includes some minor errors, but does expand on the role and timeline of Sandia’s work for the anthrax investigation.

Dr. Popov worked in the former Soviet Union’s Biopreparat Program and is a professor at George Mason University. Having met with him several years ago, I can attest to his impressive knowledge of anthrax. Here he demonstrates a deep understanding of the principles of weaponization. Some of his other comments include the following: 1. The…

Anthrax Suspicions: Why an independent look at the FBI probe is essential Friday, September 19, 2008; Page A18 THERE’S NO better proof of the need for an independent review of the FBI’s anthrax investigation than the words of Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.). Mr. Leahy was one of the intended recipients of anthrax-filled letters sent…

Webcast of the hearing can be viewed here Remember Senator Grassley’s 18 questions about the case, posed to the FBI on August 7? They have still not been answered. Senator Grassley was very impressive during the hearing: logical, refusing to be sidetracked, steady like a bulldozer. He also submitted a Statement for the Record, from…

An LA Times article by David Willman discusses an email response by virologist Peter Jahrling, one of the first people to examine the Daschle anthrax, and to remark repeatedly on its properties that indicated deliberate weaponization: After being informed of the events at the (9/16/2008 House Judiciary Committee) hearing, Jahrling renounced his earlier analysis. “In…

Webcast of the hearing can be accessed here. Eight senators attended some of today’s hearing, and had a lot more to say about the anthrax letters. The Washington Post, AP, Reuters, USA Today and Salon (Glenn Greenwald) have all posted reports of the hearing, in which the FBI was lambasted over the letters case. Most…

The House Judiciary Committee hearing can be viewed here. Eleven or twelve members attended the House Judiciary Committee’s FBI oversight hearing today. Repeatedly, they expressed disappointment with the FBI’s continuing failure to answer their questions, and to respond to written questions. Director Mueller only produced a written response to the Committee’s September 5, 2008 letter…

David Harris of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law says that in light of questions about the FBI’s public identification of the late Dr. Bruce Ivins as “the only person responsible” for the 2001 anthrax attacks, Congress should demand an independent investigation to test the government’s evidence of its accusatory claim.

With respect to whether and how the spores were weaponized, I have both feet in the weaponization camp, having reviewed numerous anthrax epidemics and seen nothing like the Senate letters’ effect elsewhere, except Sverdlovsk. Yeltsin later admitted the 1979 Sverdlovsk epidemic resulted from a leak of anthrax from a biowarfare program. However, the problem remains…

From Sandia is a press release discussing their analysis of the spores From Dr. Henry L. Niman is a discussion of how some letters only caused cutaneous anthrax, while others only caused inhalation anthrax, strong indirect support for weaponization, since in nature there are vastly more cutaneous than inhalation cases, even in areas where spores…

The Scott Shane/Eric Lichtblau New York Times article, titled “Seeking Details, Lawmakers Cite Anthrax Doubts,” is found in today’s Sunday paper, although it went online yesterday. It deserves its own post, because it is so important to this developing story. It is chock full of interesting information and quotes, like this one about how the…

Today’s excellent NY Times piece by Scott Shane and Eric Lichtblau reveals that Ivins as “sole custodian” of the RMR-1029 anthrax flask was a fiction. The flask was not always stored in Ivins’ laboratory, but kept in another building at different times between 1997 and 2001, greatly increasing the number of those who had access…

The FBI has completed its disclosures, and the media, bloggers and scientists have spent a month discussing the anthrax letters case and putative guilt of Bruce Ivins. Where does the case stand, and what remains to be answered? Hoax Letters Remain a MysteryAt least one hoax letter was apparently thought by the FBI to have…

CQ TODAY ONLINE NEWS Sept. 5, 2008 By Seth Stern, CQ Staff Members of the House Judiciary Committee made clear Friday they expect more answers from the FBI about its August announcement that a government scientist was responsible for the 2001 anthrax attacks on Capitol Hill and elsewhere. Committee members submitted a list of questions…

from the Daily Kos, by Califlander A few months ago, Plutonium Page wrote a diary about the anthrax attacks that made reference to Richard Preston’s 2002 book on the subject, called The Demon in the Freezer. Because I’d read some of Preston’s earlier work and found it interesting, I picked up a copy of The…

See September 6 version above

If Not Ivins by Katherine Heerbrandt When Norm Covert, a conservative former Fort Detrick public affairs officer, and attorney Barry Kissin, liberal activist opposing Detrick’s biolab expansion, agree that Bruce Ivins was not the anthrax killer, either the world’s spinning off its axis, or the truth is staring us so hard in the face we’d…

A transcript of the FBI’s scientific (afternoon of Aug. 18, 2008) briefing for media can be found here.

FDA answered a Freedom of Information Act request for me today. I asked how many adverse event reports had been filed for anthrax vaccine (5,931 reports through July 22, 2008) and how many FDA had designated as SERIOUS (618 reports). Serious reports are those indicating an event requiring hospitalization, a life-threatening event, permanent disability, or…

Science 22 August 2008:Vol. 321. no. 5892, pp. 1026 – 1027 excerpted from the body of the article: (my apologies that a free link is not available) …The FBI disclosed earlier that only eight samples had all four mutations; on Monday, it said that all but one of these came from USAMRIID. And all eight…

Excerpt from original story in The Oregonian indicates extensive contacts and debriefs between Haigwood and the FBI over 6 years. Although agents were close-mouthed with almost everyone else during this investigation, they apparently opened their case files for Dr. Haigwood: “Haigwood, who researches HIV transmission and vaccines, said she contacted the FBI shortly after the…

The FBI and major media have placed a lot of emphasis on the techniques used to identify the specific batch of Ames anthrax used in the Daschle/Leahy letters. Careful consideration of these methods is certainly important, for their accuracy is critical to the FBI’s theory of the case. However, at the end of the day,…

In an editorial published online today, titled “Case Not Closed,” Nature noted that “Only full disclosure can lift suspicions that the FBI has again targeted an innocent man:” … neither the conclusions drawn from the scientific analysis, nor such crucial legal elements as the veracity of the provenance and handling of samples, have been tested…

Washington Post and New York Times editorials today find the FBI’s revelations unconvincing, and call for an independent, scientific review of the evidence.

Does this case hinge on the first samples Ivins gave to the FBI, of which one was sent to Dr. Paul Keim in Arizona? Why does that sample matter, if the flask the FBI later confiscated had the same strain and genetic variability? Furthermore, if Keim’s sample is critical to the case, one must ask,…

I did not attend either FBI briefing, and the comments below relate to multiple news reports of the briefing. 1. Either one flask or two contained the specific anthrax strain in the letters–it was reported both ways in different newspapers, and apparently there was disagreement at the meeting.2. Two labs had this strain, but the…

Speaking to motive for the Daschle and Leahy letters, there might be multiple motives. The letters likely influenced their decisions on upcoming legislation like the Patriotic Act, and both had considerable power to promote or suppress legislation. The letters were likely intended to frighten all Congressional Members, whose office buildings were affected, and who, like…

A local Maryland paper provides new information from a colleague who worked at USAMRIID with Ivins through 2007, and published USAMRIID’s official response to questions.

Eric Lichtblau (NY Times) and Robert Roos (Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy ) have written two comprehensive articles discussing the scientific and other evidence that has been presented. Lichtblau also discusses a closed-door FBI briefing that took place on August 14. They conclude the case is found seriously wanting.

David Willman tells us today that the FBI missed Ivins for so many years because it was obsessed with Hatfill. Is this the FBI’s apologia? The FBI is a federal law enforcement agency; it is not a person with feelings and quirks. I don’t think we can let the FBI off the hook because of…

Itching to grapple with the scientific analysis employed by the FBI? Martin Enserink and Yudhijit Bhattacharjee of Science have done the best reporting yet on the kinds of microbial forensic evidence we are likely to see. Meanwhile, Carrie Johnson reports on House and Senate Judiciary Committee oversight panels, which have proposed September hearings to investigate…

On August 7, 2008 Senator Grassley wrote to Attorney General Mukasey and FBI Director Mueller asking them to answer 18 excellent questions about their investigation.

Case Analysis in a Nutshell 1. Ivins cannot be placed at the Princeton mailbox at either of the two times he would have to have been there.2. There are additional hoax letters that have not been discussed by FBI in the information released Wednesday; may we assume Ivins could not be placed at those mailbox…

On June 29, 2007 a Government Accountability Office report was issued regarding the military Vaccine Healthcare Centers, which were formed in 2001 to take care of injuries from anthrax vaccine. They have treated 2,400 ill soldiers, the vast majority for illnesses developing in close proximity to anthrax vaccinations. Page 4 of the report says, “Officials…

Thanks to a comment, I just reread Don Foster’s The Message in the Anthrax, published in Vanity Fair and Reader’s Digest in 2003. This is a must-read if you want to understand the universe of evidence that has accrued in this case. Foster discusses the hoax letters; the Assaad story (by Laura Rozen); how the…

DNA is just another anthrax clue, not clincher: Its use in distinguishing bacteria is limited. Some scientists want to know what else implicated Bruce ivins. By Faye Flam, Philadelphia Inquirer Staff Writer DNA evidence alone wasn’t a smoking gun in the case against Bruce Ivins as the perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax attacks, say microbiologists…

See Brad Friedman’s piece at The Guardian, UK, and this Washington Post Editorial Holes in the Anthrax Case? The nation and the FBI would benefit from an independent review of the investigation. Saturday, August 9, 2008; A14 ON WEDNESDAY, the federal government made public much of its case against accused anthrax killer Bruce E. Ivins….

In his news conference on Wednesday, August 6, US Attorney Jeffrey Taylor mentioned (evidence point 4) that while Ivins had been under 24/7 surveillance, he discarded some materials on DNA coding. If the FBI was about to charge Ivins, you would expect he was still under 24/7 surveillance, right? Well, a tylenol overdose is entirely…

Allen McDuffee of Raw Story.com provides this tidbit, indicating Karl Rove knew the vaccine was problematic based on materials from Ross Perot.

Many have asked me if Ivins’ anthrax vaccinations or meds might have contributed to his mental state. Bruce admitted a family history of emotional problems, his brother Tom appears psychiatrically impaired, and I don’t mean to make light of this history. However, the answer to whether anthrax vaccine leads to mental disorders is a resounding…

CDC, which performed some vaccine tests, acknowledged in 1968 that, “As to the efficacy of the vaccine, we have no real method of determining the protection afforded.” FDA records show that in 1969 the ad hoc committee to license anthrax vaccine found a lack of “scientific evidence for efficacy of the vaccine.” The committee chairman,…

From Eric Lipton in the Aug 9 NY Times: “There was a real threat, the former colleagues acknowledged, that the anthrax vaccine Dr. Ivins had worked on during that period, known as Anthrax Vaccine Absorbed or AVA, might be pulled from the market Most troubling were problems at the Michigan manufacturing plant, which had been…

From the very enlightening NPR interview with Ivins’ attorney, Paul Kemp: “They have a Secret Service document examiner who examined the stamps on these pre-franked envelopes [envelopes with prepaid postage] that contained the anthrax in the anthrax attacks. And because of microscopic defects, you’re correct, he was able to tie those to lots or a…

Just for fun, let’s investigate some facets of the FBI’s case: 1. Leaks last weekend claimed that Ivins was about to be charged with committing the anthrax crime. Turns out, FBI had not yet brought its evidence against Ivins to a grand jury. And one of his attorneys denies that he was told he was…

CorrectionGuess El-Hibry knew what he was doing when he sold 230,100 shares of the anthrax vaccine manufacturer between July 17 and August 6, since the vaccine company Emergent Biosolutions reported poor net earnings despite sales being up 88% this quarter. On sales of 230,100 shares since mid July, he earned about $3 million dollars. Note…

The shiny new methods of “microbial forensics,” touted by the FBI for months as offering a new break in the case, have in fact revealed little or nothing. As the New York Times’ Scott Shane and Eric Lichtblau reveal, “officials admitted that more than 100 people had access to the supply of anthrax that matched…

If the FBI cannot place Ivins at the scene of the crime (the Princeton mailbox) on the required dates, then who cares what sorority houses might be near the mailbox? The sorority angle becomes irrelevant, since he did not mail the letters in Princeton. Remember, this is one of the most complex, expensive cases in…

U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Taylor said at a Justice Department news conference, “We regret that we will not have the opportunity to present evidence to the jury.” Everybody else regrets it too–since what came out today was another pastiche of innuendo and circumstantial evidence, with an awful lot of holes. Time for the FBI to present…

See what power reporting has? It can solidify a tower of Bullshit, or cause it to collapse. The bloggers deserve a lot of credit for transforming the Ivins reportage, via impressive investigations and and logical thinking. Their work may have turned this case from one of conviction by innuendo — into one that will receive…

The NY Times’ Scott Shane and Nicholas Wade are drilling down on the essentials, elaborating on who had access to the particular anthrax found in Ivins’ lab and, purportedly, the letters: But at least 10 scientists had regular access to the laboratory and its anthrax stock — and possibly quite a few more, counting visitors…

Bloggers Larisa Alexandrovna (Raw Story.com) and Glenn Greenwald (Salon.com) beat the major press on Jean Duley’s background. Seems she has an extensive police record including two arrests for DUI since 2006 and a remote drug paraphernalia charge. I suspected as much, having read that she was involved in treating addicts with Suboxone. Many substance abuse…

Scott Shane, who has always done terrific reporting on the anthrax letters story, first at the Baltimore Sun, later at the NY Times, has again hit a home run. His piece, Anthrax Evidence is Said to be Primarily Circumstantial, lays out the kind of case that may be made against Ivins. Unfortunately, the evidence reported…

This am’s Hartford Courant carries a sensible Op-Ed. It ends, Congress should press the Justice Department for a full and public accounting of this case. Forcing the FBI to lay out its evidence against Mr. Ivins is the only way the public can be sure the agency’s methods were reasonable. It’s only fair.

CNN notes, The DNA linked the anthrax used in the mailing to a flask used in Bruce Ivins’ lab at the U.S. Army Medical Institute of Infectious Diseases, said the source, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case. Maybe so, though I am awfully tired of all these “unauthorized” sources who talk…

The media have reported that some biodefense scientists said Ivins couldn’t produce the powdered anthrax found in the letters, but at least one scientist said he could. One problem is that the public does not know how the letters’ anthrax was produced, nor whether it contained an additive that promoted dispersion. Anthrax is produced in…

From a story in the Frederick News-Post: Duley’s fiance of seven years, Mike McFadden, spoke to The Frederick News-Post on Saturday from their home in Williamsport and provided a statement on her behalf. “Jean is currently at an undisclosed location,” McFadden said. Duley had numerous meetings with the FBI in the past month, McFadden said,…

On the one hand, the Justice Department is considering closing the anthrax letters case this week. On the other hand, the FBI seized computers (and this time with no court order) from the Frederick Public Library this week. Looks like they were in a hurry. Last two times they examined computers they had a court…

Glenn Greenwald has written a nice piece today in Salon.com on journalists, anonymous sources and the anthrax letters case. He discusses Ivins at the beginning and end of his long article.

The AP has reported startling and frightening claims by Dr. Ivins’ therapist Jean Duley in several stories, including one just published by Dishneau and Jordan: Report: Therapist feared scientist poisoned people She claimed, “As far back as the year 2000, the respondent has actually attempted to murder several other people, either through poisoning. He is…

http://www.courant.com/news/local/hc-anthrax0802,0,2705314.story My comments to a reporter were misinterpreted and I want to clarify them. The story says, “Ivins was a civilian working in the Army’s main bioterrorism program. Nass said Ivins always complained about being treated poorly by some of the military personnel.” Bruce did not ever complain to me about being “treated poorly.” I…

A friend put this article into HTML and added some links to the references. I think it is valuable background for understanding the letters case.

Back in 2002, in preparation for an interview on the anthrax letters for “Unsolved Mysteries,” I reviewed the media coverage. As I read article after article, I found that the statements most germane to an understanding of the case were almost entirely unsourced. It was unnerving to conclude that I knew very little about the…

The anthrax letters did not test anyone’s vaccine. For people exposed to the anthrax letters, anthrax vaccine was given in three doses over 4 weeks. It takes about 4-6 weeks after vaccinations start before recipients develop levels of antibodies to anthrax that may be protective. The vaccine’s label even points out that anthrax vaccine is…

For 7 years the Justice Department couldn’t seem to get anything right about the anthrax letters. For years, it harrassed Steven Hatfill, a self-described bodyguard for South African white supremacist Eugene Terrblanche and an unlicensed physician, despite a shocking lack of evidence. He is now $5.8 million richer as a result. But the White House…