Antrax? What anthrax? (Digest).

MicroSent, a Swiss company, has developed a range of portable fine-particle aerosol generators aimed at deodorising rooms -- deodorising meaning that the patented five-micron hydrogen peroxide-based particles kill the innocuous contaminants; as opposed to only covering them up. The non-remnant particles are fine enough to penetrate cloth and porous materials (wallpaper and paint) within minutes. MicroSent is now in the final stages of testing the MS 3000 seen here in prototype form, a unit designed to treat entire buildings by connecting to its own existing air-conditioning ducts. The chemicals used are currently being examined for approval by a French health laboratory and enable a 60,000 [m.sup.3] building contaminated by say, anthrax, bacteria, spores, mould, chemical warfare agents or other nerve gasses to be cleared in one hour. Instrumental in the success of the system is the size of the aerosol particles, since these are so small that they can not wet or soil any of the surfaces they come in contact with (and yet large enough not to damage lung cells), do not deposit in air ducts and, above all, do not mutate -- unlike antibiotics. The particles differ from other agents used in hospitals, as they do not smell or cause allergies. It has also appeared that bruised skins exposed to the aerosol for a certain period of time will heel far more rapidly. As said above, because the aerosol is not a wet agent, it will also decontaminate computers and any other electronic or convoluted mechanical equipment with no adverse effects. Fully equipped military vehicles and their occupants could thus be driven into a decontaminating tent and be disinfected/decontaminated inside out within minutes. Likewise, the system could appear as a key solution to military mobile hospital or command room hygiene and decontamination problems. The MS 3000 would also solve the problem of buildings contaminated by the efflux of a neighbouring buildings' air-conditioning system. The unit's generators are equipped with full monitoring and recording equipment and, of course, protected control access.