Ricin letters have had no harmful effects

WASHINGTON -- Over the past two months, authorities have seized letters laced with the toxin ricin intended for the CIA, President Barack Obama and other public officials.

Viewed as "copy cat" events by some investigators, the letters have generated high-profile coverage on television and were widely reported by other media organizations, including the nation's major newspapers.

But experts say the ricin that has been sent through the mail has posed little health risk for two reasons.

One is that considerable laboratory expertise would be needed to purify, concentrate and dry the toxin in a way that makes it potentially lethal by inhalation. And, compared with another feared bioterrorism agent, anthrax, ricin is not nearly as toxic when released through the air.

Not a single person exposed to ricin sent through the mail this year -- or ever, authorities say -- has died or been found by doctors to have been sickened by it.

What distinguishes ricin from other Category B bioterrorism agents listed by the CDC is that it is easily obtained. Referring to the tests of the ricin letters to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Mayors Against Illegal Guns, NYPD spokesman Paul J. Browne said: "The national lab had told us that the ricin was crude and low-level, crudely produced. This looks like somebody who may just have smashed up a bunch of [castor] beans."

A spokeswoman for the FBI, Ayn S. Dietrich, confirmed that no illness has been reported in connection with a ricin-laced letter sent in early May to a U.S. District Court judge in Spokane, Wash., or with four "similar letters," including one addressed to Obama and another to the CIA in Langley, Va. A suspect from Washington state has been indicted on a charge of mailing threatening communications to the judge.