1:21pm Thursday 4th January 2007
By Ruth Holmes
TWO more people have tested positive to polonium-210 more than two months after the former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned with the substance.
At least 12 other people have tested positive for low levels of the radioactive isotope, the Health Protection Agency (HPA) revealed today.
A member of staff at the Best Western Premier Shaftesbury Hotel in Piccadilly and a guest who visited the Pine Bar of London's Millenium Hotel in Grosvenor Square on the day of the alleged poisoning are the latest to have been contaminated.
Mr Litvinenko had met the former KGB agent Andrei Lugovoi and business associate Dmitry Kovtun at the Millennium Hotel on November 1 - the day he fell ill. Mr Kovtun also became ill from radiation poisoning last month.
Two rooms at the hotels in question were sealed off to the public as part of the police investigation but have since been given the all-clear.
The HPA said the levels of polonium-210 found in the 12 who have tested positive did not pose any danger to them.
"The levels are not significant enough to result in any illness in the short term and any increased risk in the long term is likely to be very small," a statement from the HPA said.
Polonium-210 is found in the environment and at low concentrations in people and poses a risk only if inhaled, swallowed or ingested through an open wound.
The agency is continuing to provide advice on the public health issues surrounding Mr Litvinenko's death and has been monitoring several locations across London to assess the health risks. It said there was "no public health concern in the open public areas" and that the risk to the general public was "very low".
Last month the HPA said it had found low levels of radiation in nine workers at the Millennium Hotel and two members of staff at the Sheraton Hotel in Park Lane.
Some 536 urine samples tested by the HPA have found nothing of concern.
Anyone who was in The Pine Bar on November 1, who has not yet contacted NHS Direct, is advised to do so.
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