I thought they might be too optimistic. This guy is in serious doo doo.
Diomande, 44, had been listed in stable condition at Robert Packer Hospital in Sayre, Pa., just south of the New York border. But in a statement issued Friday, the hospital said the patient had “experienced increased difficulty breathing during the course of the day, resulting in a change in his condition to serious.”
At City Hall, Bloomberg revealed that testing had indicated the presence of low levels of anthrax at the Brooklyn warehouse and at Diomande’s apartment in Greenwich Village.
But the mayor insisted the finding “is not a surprise and should not cause alarm.” Both sites, he added, would undergo an extensive cleanup.
City officials again emphasized that the treatment with antibiotics of the seven people who may have been exposed to the hides — including members of Diomande’s family and a fellow craftsman — was only a precaution, and that investigators had found no evidence of any serious threat to public health.
Diomande, a drum maker and dancer, traveled in December to Ivory Coast, in West Africa, and returned with several goat hides he used to make drums. He began feeling flu-like symtoms in January before collapsing last week after performing with his dance company in Mansfield, Pa.
Before his downturn, Dimonde had helped investigators retrace his steps. “He talked extensively,” the mayor said. “He was very forthcoming exactly where he went, what he did, how he got the hides — all of that.”
