By ALAN FRAM
Associated Press Writer
Inspecting Daschle's office
AP/Maya Alleruzzo [29K]
WASHINGTON (AP) — Authorities closed an entire wing of an eight-story Senate office building Tuesday and prepared to test and treat hundreds of people for possible exposure to anthrax after overnight tests confirmed the bacterium in mail opened in the office of Majority Leader Tom Daschle.
``There will be several hundred people that will be screened today,'' said Dr. John Eisold, the attending physician at the Capitol. All of them will receive enough antibiotics to cover them until the results of their tests are known.
At a news conference outside the Capitol, police spokesman Dan Nichols repeated numerous times that the only ``positive'' identification of anthrax spores had come on the mail itself.
Tom Daschle
AP/Dennis Cook [31K]
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But Eisold said that as a precaution, staff, police, cleaning crews, visitors and anyone else who had been in the corner of the building that houses Daschle's office were being urged to undergo nasal-swab testing.
He said officials decided ``to draw up the net as widely as possible and err on the conservative side and test and treat.''
Nichols said the closure in the Hart building involved the offices of a dozen senators, Daschle's among them. The majority leader maintains a separate office in the Capitol that was not affected.
The police spokesman said that all mail delivery had been suspended in the Capitol complex while authorities put new security procedures in place. He announced on Monday that all public tours of the Capitol had been suspended indefinitely, although he said that was unrelated to the delivery of anthrax-tainted mail.
Daschle said earlier in the day that so far, test results have been negative for the 50 or so people who were checked on Monday, when an employee opened a piece of mail that contained a white powdery substance