Iowa, NYC ERs closed for suspicious powder

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http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/SUSPICIOUS_POWDER?SITE=TXSAE&SECTION=US&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-05-20-14-37-00

A hospital emergency room was locked down for more than two hours after a postal worker came in who had been exposed to a suspicious powder in a letter, officials said.

In New York City, three people prompted a similar response at a Brooklyn hospital after one received white powder in the mail.

Initial tests in Iowa indicated the substance found Thursday at the city's main post office was a mixture of rat poison and wheat flour, fire department spokesman Brian O'Keefe said. The worker, who had come in to Mercy Medical Center around 5 a.m., was checked out and released and the investigation was continuing.

In Brooklyn, three family members went to Wyckoff Heights Medical Center on Thursday night after one of them, a 24-year-old woman, said she had received an envelope containing white powder in her mailbox earlier in the week. She said she later developed flu-like symptoms, including a stuffy nose.