Last Updated

06 Feb 2003

Source: Washington Post, February 7, 2002.

73 Senate Workers Report Illness

Advisory Issued to D.C. Federal Employees on Handling Irradiated Mail

By Spencer S. Hsu, Washington Post Staff Writer

Seventy-three employees of the U.S. Senate have reported health problems including headaches, eye irritation and skin rash after handling irradiated mail, and the government has issued a cautionary advisory to 180,000 federal workers in the District.

The figure was disclosed yesterday by Senate officers in response to a query by Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) and at a closed-door briefing to concerned Senate staffers. The meeting was held by a task force set up by Senate officers to investigate health concerns arising from the Hart Senate Office Building anthrax cleanup.

In addition to the mail, some senators question whether their staff members are feeling ill from chemicals used to decontaminate the Hart building. Senate officials are still trying to get a tally of complaints from Hart workers about health issues related to that building.

The mail advisory was issued last Thursday by the General Services Administration. While mail "does not contain any residual radiation or radioactivity," the bulletin said, "a small number of federal employees within the D.C. metro area have experienced problems."

The agency said government workers may "minimize" potential problems by wearing nonlatex, powder-free gloves or asking others to open their mail if they have sensitive skin; after handling mail, using moisturizer after washing hands; and storing and opening mail in a ventilated area to disperse vapors left over from irradiation.

Senate staffers who attended a 90-minute briefing in the Russell Senate Office Building said it was contentious. Workers tried to press representatives of the Office of the Attending Physician of the Capitol, U.S. Postal Service, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the EPA about the cause of employee complaints.

"The doctors and scientists running the meeting said everyone who is having ill-health effects should go to the Capitol physician's office and be examined, but they also said, 'Well, it's flu season,' " said one aide, who asked not to be named. "There was a strong implication that the mail should not be making people sick, but then people were complaining that it is."

Briefers reportedly told Senate workers that 73 complaints from three Senate office buildings that employ 4,000 people is not extraordinary.

Grassley said in a statement that government officials have told him that the mail should be safe because the dosage at which mail is irradiated was lowered by 40 percent in mid-December, and treated mail is increasingly ventilated to disperse chemical residue.

The alerts mark the latest step in the government's trial-and-error recovery from October's anthrax crisis, when letters packed with deadly microbes were sent to two senators, and traces of spores were found in two dozen local government and postal locations.

Mail delivery to Congress was stopped Oct. 15 and resumed in late November. Mail to District government offices with Zip codes that begin 202, 203, 204 and 205 is now shipped to facilities in Lima, Ohio, and Bridgeport, N.J., for irradiation. The GSA notice said that government-bound correspondence takes about eight days from mailing to delivery.

Employee complaints increased when senators and staff members reoccupied the Hart building Jan. 19 after a $20 million Environmental Protection Agency decontamination.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said yesterday that 16 employees in his office have complained of headaches, burning eyes and breathing problems from a "very heavy odor" of chlorine, which was used to fumigate portions of the building.

Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.) has asked for independent environmental testing from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. EPA Ombudsman Robert J. Martin has asked the agency for test results showing that the building was safe to reopen.

Richard Rupert, EPA on-site coordinator, said that daily tests taken since Jan. 1 have shown no concentration of chlorine dioxide over 100 parts per billion, the federal workplace safety standard. More sophisticated tests last weekend found that none of 15 samples exceeded 5 parts per billion.

"We haven't seen any chlorine dioxide to have a link" to reported symptoms, said Rupert, who said the agency welcomed comment from the Livermore lab. "There is no pattern."

EPA spokesman Joseph Martyak said new carpeting, walls, adhesives and cleaners have been used extensively to prepare Hart for reopening, and that air circulation has been a concern of the building's managers.

Senate Sergeant-at-Arms Alfonso E. Lenhardt, who created the legislative mail task force, also welcomed Livermore's assets. A spokeswoman added that as mail treated at lower levels of radiation arrives, "We do expect symptoms will be reduced, but we've got to wait and see."