# Couldn't they radiate the mail to kill the Anthrax virus?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [October 23, 2001, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131 "2001-10-23T17:44:20Z")
**Posts on this page:** 11
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@miamouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/miamouse)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/1 "2001-10-23T17:44:20Z")
Don’t they do that to certain food products to kill potential germs? Would exposing mail to radiation kill the virus or just cause it to mutate?
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### Author:  [@Spanky\_The\_Dolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spanky_The_Dolphin)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/2 "2001-10-23T17:49:46Z")
According to snopes, sunlight is the only thing that kills Anthrax.
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### Author:  [@micco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/micco)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/3 "2001-10-23T17:58:51Z")
CNN had a report this morning that the USPS had modified the blowers on their mail processing machines (formerly used to clear dust from the mechanisms) and were shopping for UV disinfectant systems.
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### Author:  [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/4 "2001-10-23T18:10:31Z")
> [@](#):
>
> According to snopes, sunlight is the only thing that kills Anthrax.
Nonsense. Antibiotics certainly kill it, though it’s obviously not practical to immerse your junk mail in Cipro.
The Snopes site [sez](http://www.snopes2.com/): “Sunshine destroys anthrax spores, but very little else does. Heat doesn’t, radiation doesn’t. It’s resistant to explosives. That’s precisely the reason why anthrax was developed as a weapon, because it’s tough, whereas most bacteria and viruses are fragile”
The snopes quote apparently came from [this article](http://www.cnn.com/2001/COMMUNITY/10/15/guillemin/) posted on CNN. It’s not clear what the author means by ‘radiation’. ‘Irradiation’, as in bombarding anthrax spores with gamma radiation, the same process used to irradiate food and kill bacteria, was not specifically discussed in that article.
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### Author:  [@Spanky\_The\_Dolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spanky_The_Dolphin)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/5 "2001-10-23T18:25:46Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by squeegee \*
> The Snopes site [sez](http://www.snopes2.com/): “Sunshine destroys anthrax spores, but very little else does. Heat doesn’t, radiation doesn’t. It’s resistant to explosives. That’s precisely the reason why anthrax was developed as a weapon, because it’s tough, whereas most bacteria and viruses are fragile”
Yeah, that’s what I meant. Thanks squeegee. It was a few days since I saw the article at Snopes, but I remembered the basic idea.
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### Author:  [@DPWhite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPWhite)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/6 "2001-10-23T18:44:26Z")
The post office is talking about using small linear accelerators to expose mail to ionizing radiation, killing anything inside. This requires electricity. I think that enough such radiation would kill anything.
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### Author:  [@JillGat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JillGat)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/7 "2001-10-23T18:49:50Z")
Bleach and some other disinfectants will kill anthrax spores. It’s not practical to use such a thing on mail, obviously.
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### Author:  [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/8 "2001-10-23T19:25:09Z")
Another [irradiation article](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36218-2001Oct22.html).
I don’t know where Snopes is coming from. Killing anthrax by exposure to sunlight _is_ irradiation. It is probably most effective in the ultraviolet spectrum.
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### Author:  [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/9 "2001-10-23T19:36:49Z")
Anthrax is a bacterium, not a virus. This is significant, because if it was a virus, it would be much harder to treat like the common cold.
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### Author:  [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/10 "2001-10-23T20:44:01Z")
CNN is reporting as I type that the White House is using some sort of ‘scanner’ that will kill Anthrax spores in incoming mail. The WH is not disclosing the details, but this is a apparently a machine that you stick parcels into and it cleanses them of Anthrax spores. Radiation of some sort would be a reasonable guess as to how it works.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2001, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/couldnt-they-radiate-the-mail-to-kill-the-anthrax-virus/89131/11 "2001-10-23T21:01:28Z")
We discussed this just the other day in this thread:
[Sterilize the Mail?](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=93383).
The conclusion seems to be that the level of radiation required to effectively destroy anthrax spores would be unmanageably dangerous.