Brokaw's Asst Tests Positive for Anthrax

October 12, 2001 -- Media outlets are on alert after an NBC News employee in New York City tested positive for anthrax, the network and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said today.

NBC officials, speaking off the record, told The Associated Press that the woman in question is news anchor Tom Brokaw's assistant, and that she had handled a suspicious piece of mail addressed to Brokaw.Giuliani also confirmed that several floors of the New York Times offices in Manhattan were evacuated today after suspicious mail was received, according to ABCNEWS.com.

"The New York Times received a letter with a powdery substance," Giuliani said.

Police and health officials did not yet know if the substance tested positive for anthrax, but were on the scene and investigating, Giuliani said.

The NBC employee, whose name was withheld, was infected through her skin, in a form of the disease known as cutaneous anthrax, Giuliani said at a news conference with NBC network head Andrew Lack and FBI officials. The woman works on the third floor of the company's Manhattan headquarters, where the Today show and NBC Nightly News are produced. She was responding well to treatment, Lack said. "She is in good health and in good care," Lack said. The woman opened a piece of suspicious mail on Sept. 25, but the powder inside tested negative for anthrax, Giuliani said. Health officials began monitoring the woman, but she did not test positive until this morning, the mayor said. She had been treated with the antibiotic Cipro as a precaution shortly after her apparent exposure.

Rosie O'Donnell Suspends ProductionSeveral floors of the NBC headquarters at 30 Rockefeller Center will be closed for several days, Giuliani said, as health officials test the building. All employees working in the area are being tested for the disease, but there have been no other positive results. Following the news, Rosie O'Donnell canceled production of her talk show through next week, and suspended production until further notice, according to Entertainment Tonight, and Saturday Night Live guest host Drew Barrymore immediately left rehearsal at the SNL studios, which are located across the hall from Rosie.

Giuliani told a news conference there was no reason for the public to be concerned. "This is in very good hands," he said. Health officials, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the FBI, were investigating the infection.

"One piece of good news is that if anyone else was going to be infected, they would have been infected by now," Giuliani said. Still, as a precaution, those who had been tested were being given Cipro antibiotics.

Giuliani and Barry Mawn, head of the FBI's New York office, stressed there was no evidence the infection was the work of terrorists. "We see no connection whatsoever" to the Sept. 11 terror attacks, emphasized Mawn. The letter the NBC employee handled contained a powder, and was reported as suspicious to company security, General Electric Vice Chairman Bob Wright said at the news conference today. GE owns NBC. The envelope was forwarded to police. Skin-Based Anthrax Seldom Fatal Cutaneous anthrax accounts for 95 percent of all known anthrax cases, and is rarely fatal with appropriate treatment. This form of infection typically comes from a cut or abrasion that allows the anthrax bacterium to enter the skin. The FBI is already investigating the exposure of three employees of The Sun tabloid newspaper in Boca Raton, Fla. One of the employees, 63-year-old photo editor Bob Stevens, died of inhalation anthrax, which is both very rare and usually fatal. Two other employees there tested positive for exposure to anthrax. "We are in coordination with our Miami office to see if there are similarities," Mawn said today. Giuliani Urges Caution With Suspicious Packages Giuliani encouraged people worried about suspicious mail to call authorities, and not to open or shake it. "The thing to do is to call 911," he said. "Leave it where it is."

ABCNEWS.com contributed to this story.