020537 Focus Is On Food in Yonkers Illnesses

Yonkers, NY - Five people poisoned in Yonkers were likely sickened by something they ate, authorities said yesterday as they dismissed fears of chemical contamination.

A Food and Drug Administration lab in Queens is testing meat from a dinner the five shared Thursday before they fell ill. Authorities also were checking spices, oils, cleaning products and processed foods one of the victims brought from Egypt.

"They are testing the meat now, along with whatever else was on the kitchen table, but the feeling is that the cause was something in the apartment and that this is an isolated incident," said Patrick Quinn, a spokesman for the Westchester County Health Department.

Health authorities said that whatever the five ate caused an immediate toxic reaction - difficulty breathing, dizziness and stupor - as their blood lost its ability to carry oxygen and their skin turned blue.

"I thought we were going to die. I looked down and my skin was blue - like I'd been dead for a couple of days," Atef Bishara, 40, said as he sat up in his bed at St. Joseph's Medical Center in Yonkers.

Bishara was recuperating yesterday, as were two of his friends, Samir Massoud, 45, and Nady Angly, 41.

But Bishara's mother, Fawzia Mima of White Plains, and Bishara's friend Afefe Andrews were still in critical condition on respirators at St. Joseph's. Sam Khabor, another friend who visited the apartment but had not eaten the broiled beef and yellow rice, did not get sick.

Beef Blamed

Bishara blamed the poisoning on meat he bought at Sam's Club in Elmsford. But police and health officials downplayed that possibility because other customers bought the same cut of meat there and had not gotten sick. The entire lot of beef was taken off the shelves for precautionary reasons.

Dr. Nicholas DeRobertis of St. Joseph's said anything ranging from nitroglycerin to mothballs could trigger the toxic reaction. He rejected reports that the five had suffered cyanide poisoning.

DeRobertis said something the victims ingested had damaged their red blood cells so they could not transfer oxygen to tissue, a rare condition called methemoglobinemia.

It is unlike ordinary food poisoning, he said, in that it is a respiratory rather than a gastrointestinal illness.

The outbreak led to a massive response from terror-wary authorities, including the evacuation of the apartment building and the appearance of the FBI-NYPD Joint Terrorism Task Force.

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