Chkalovskiy division of the Federal Consumer Rights Protection and Human Well-Being Agency (aka Rospotrebnadzor) in Sverdlovsk Region has been receiving applications from the district dwellers regarding rumors of possible contamination of soil with anthrax since December 2006.

Following the request of local public prosecution bodies, Rospotrebnadzor conducted an additional inquiry that revealed that the rumors actually have to do with the construction that takes place in a certain area of Vtorchermet district of Yekaterinburg known as Nikanorovka. As soon as the city council allots a patch previously used as a parking lot or place for private garages to the builders, there begins gossip of soil infected with anthrax.

Rospotrebnadzor’s experts obtained some soil samples and sent them to a special biological laboratory; the laboratory said the soil contained no pathogenic forms of anthrax either at vegetative or cryptogamic stage.