When a letter containing anthrax was found in Sen. Tom Daschle’s (D-S.D.) office, the office was shut down and quarantined, daily tours were canceled and aides to Daschle received the antibiotic Cipro while they started testing each for exposure to anthrax.

Authorities made the correct decision to take quick and immediate precautions, especially considering the potential seriousness of the situation.

But when it became clear the same day that the infected letter came from the Brentwood Road mail sorting facility, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention made no presumptions that the building could have been contaminated as well. Workers there were not tested because the CDC said it wasn’t necessary “until there was an evidence chain that indicated there was anthrax present in the facility,” according to the New York Times.

Now postal workers from the Brentwood facility, which handles Congressional mail, are dead.

Officials Tuesday confirmed that two Washington, D.C. postal employees died of pulmonary anthrax, an extremely severe form of the disease, and at least three others are hospitalized with the same form of anthrax.

Now the CDC is coming under harsh criticism, criticism it rightfully deserves. The CDC’s doctors are America’s defense against this kind of terrorism and their negligence in failing to take similar precautions at the postal facilities the Daschle letter came from is wrong.

As one Brentwood employee put it, they closed the House down while employees were in there inhaling it.

It seems unfair and rather questionable that this breakdown in response by the CDC ever occurred.

If it was clear CDC officials knew immediately where these contaminated letters came from, which they did, there should have been no hesitation to take the same precautions at the postal facility that were taken at the Capitol.

The differences in the two responses are a little too alarming. As America becomes increasingly paranoid, the CDC should reassure citizens that things are under control.

When their actions, or lack there of, result in the deaths of postal workers, that reassurance won’t be there. And if the public doesn’t trust those responsible for solving this anthrax mess, paranoia will increase. And that is not good for the country.

People were dying in a building the CDC knew the anthrax-laden letter passed through, and the building wasn’t evacuated and employees weren’t given the antibiotics the House office immediately received.

Someone needs to be held responsible for this and the CDC needs to make sure it will not happen again.

editorialboard: Andrea Hauser, Tim Paluch, Michelle Kann, Zach Calef, Omar Tesdell