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War threat crisis talks on anthrax ====================== Fraser Nelson westminster editor The Scotsman http://www.thescotsman.co.uk AN international bioterrorism summit is to be held at a secret London location tomorrow when health ministers will discuss the risk of anthrax attacks and the ramifications of taking on Saddam Hussein. Alan Milburn, the Health Secretary, is to meet five of his counterparts to discuss their contingency plans for dealing with a biological weapon attack on civilians. The meeting comes after Tony Blair met Dick Cheney, the vice President of the United States, in London yesterday to give his personal support for taking action against Iraq. Health ministers from Japan, Mexico, France, Germany and the US will meet to share intelligence on vaccine stocks and methods of responding to a bioterrorism attack. Mr Milburn is expected to tell them how the NHS model has given Britain the capability to co-ordinate a national response to any epidemic. The two-day summit was organised by Mr Milburn before Iraq returned to the political agenda. However, discussions are now expected to centre on the implications of squaring up to Saddam while he still commands substantial stocks of anthrax. After meeting Mr Cheney in Downing Street, Mr Blair said they both agreed the need to act in a "calm and measured" way to deal with Saddam and his stock of weapons. "He is the only leader in the world who has actually used chemical weapons against his own people," the Prime Minister said. President George Bush yesterday gave the same message to relatives of the victims of 11 September, who gathered in New York to commemorate the six months since the attack. The second phase in the war against terrorism, he said, would be directed at the risk posed by such weapons. "Every nation in our coalition must take seriously the growing threat of terror on a catastrophic scale, terror armed with biological, chemical or nuclear weapons," he said. "America is now consulting with friends and allies about this greatest of dangers and we're determined to confront it." The US delegate to the bioterrorism conference is Claude Allen, the deputy health secretary, who is expected to admit that the US is buying anthrax vaccines and is still struggling to establish central control over its fractured network of privately-run hospitals. The conference will also be shown documents laying out worst-case scenarios for anthrax attacks. They suggest that 100kg of anthrax aerosol released over Washington could lead to between 130,000 and three million deaths. They also suggest that the release of 50kg of anthrax spores from an aircraft over a city with five million residents will leave 250,000 casualties - of which 100,000 would die without proper treatment. The state of vaccines will also be discussed. Worldwide stocks of smallpox vaccine will be measured at about 90 million - however, many of these were produced in the 1980s. Since President Bush's "axis of evil" speech in January, Saddam's anthrax stockpiles have been extensively detailed by intelligence reports from both London and Washington. It is feared he could easily liaise with terrorists willing to use anthrax spores to attack civilian targets in the West. The Foreign Office has produced a briefing note arguing that Saddam's "production of agents such as anthrax and the cancer-inducing aflatoxin has been clearly understated". The US State Department's briefing suggests that even if Saddam's anthrax stocks are low, he can start production in laboratories which currently produce legitimate vaccines and other pharmaceuticals. "Without effective United Nations monitoring, Baghdad could probably begin production within a few days," says the briefing. "For example, Iraq can convert production of biopesticides to anthrax simply by changing seed material." Officials from various health departments will start negotiations tomorrow and high-ranking ministers will arrive in London from Thursday. The World Health Organisation is sending Dr David Heyman, its executive director of communicable diseases, while the European Union is sending its health commissioner, David Bryne. The meeting sprang from a conference in Ottawa, Canada, in October last year. It was originally the health ministers from the G7 group of countries, but attracted interest from others. --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: [email protected] EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
