Pentagon Orders Comprehensive Review of Anthrax Lab Work

— -- The Pentagon has ordered a comprehensive review of its laboratory facilities that handle anthrax after finding more labs in the United States that may have mistakenly received live anthrax, U.S. officials said.

Any laboratories that may have received inactive anthrax samples from the Pentagon in the past have also been advised to stop working with those samples until they get more instruction from the Defense Department and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"As of now, 24 laboratories in 11 states and two foreign countries are believed to have received suspect samples," the Pentagon said in statement this evening.

Previously the Pentagon had said 18 laboratories in 9 states and a military laboratory in South Korea may have mistakenly been sent live anthrax samples.

A review of operations at the U.S. Army's Dugway Proving Ground in Utah also found another batch of live anthrax that may have been shipped to Australia in 2008, U.S. officials said earlier today.

Officials are trying to determine what institutions in Australia received the possibly live anthrax and its whereabouts.

In light of the new information Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work ordered “a comprehensive review of DoD laboratory procedures, processes, and protocols associated with inactivating spore-forming anthrax."

He also ordered all military laboratories that have anthrax materials “to test all previously inactivated spore-forming anthrax in the inventory.”

All laboratories that may have received inactive anthrax from the Pentagon in the past have been advised to stop working with those samples until they receive further instruction from the Defense Department and the Centers for Disease Control.”

Last Friday, a private laboratory in Maryland informed the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that it had received a live sample of anthrax. Further investigation determined that the batch of anthrax that had been the source of the shipment had not been fully irradiated in March 2014 and contained both live and inactivated anthrax spores, according to a Department of Defense official.

The laboratories have located their samples and sent them to the CDC for testing to determine if they too received live anthrax.

No workers who came into contact with the samples have exhibited any symptoms of anthrax infection, according to the Pentagon and the CDC.

However, as a protective measure, three lab workers in the United States and 22 military lab workers in South Korea are receiving antibiotic treatments, officials said.