Police have been called to the Guggenheim and P.S. 290 on the Upper East Side today after reports of "suspicious powder" at both locations. The NYPD press office tells us that in both instances, the powder was enclosed in letters mailed to the addresses, and its makeup is "undetermined."
Yesterday, suspicious powder was reported at the Neue Galerie in a similar fashion. All of this seems very 2001 until you see that in the past week or so, institutions across the country have been plagued with this "mysterious powder." Is cornstarch powder the new AOL trial disc?
In case the powder does turn out to be anthrax and not, say, the stuff that art museums are more accustomed to being splayed out in their bathroom stalls, the CDC has you covered:
Anthrax is a serious disease caused by Bacillus anthracis, a bacterium that forms spores. A bacterium is a very small organism made up of one cell. Many bacteria can cause disease. A spore is a cell that is dormant (asleep) but may come to life with the right conditions.
In most cases, early treatment with antibiotics can cure cutaneous anthrax. Even if untreated, 80 percent of people who become infected with cutaneous anthrax do not die. Gastrointestinal anthrax is more serious because between one-fourth and more than half of cases lead to death. Inhalation anthrax is much more severe. In 2001, about half of the cases of inhalation anthrax ended in death.
What ever happened to using a stinkbomb to clear out an area? Do we really have to make people fear for their lives?
