U.S. screens, evacuates staff over health mystery in China

GUANGZHOU, CHINA — A U.S. medical team was screening more Americans who work at the consulate in southern China as the State Department confirmed evacuating a number of government employees who experienced unexplained health issues like those that have hurt U.S. personnel in Cuba and China.

The evacuations of workers in Guangzhou followed medical testing that revealed they might have b een affected. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said “a number of individuals” had been brought to the U.S. but didn’t say how many were affected or evacuated. A previous case in Guangzhou, disclosed last month, prompted the tests.

Nauert also said that remaining U.S. government personnel and their families in Guangzhou would also be able to request testing if they “noted concerning symptoms or wanted baseline screening.”

The U.S. government has deemed those incidents “specific attacks” on American workers but hasn’t publicly identified a cause or culprit. Most of the incidents were accompanied by bizarre, unexplained sounds that initially led U.S. investigators to suspect a sonic attack.

The American government worker who previously was removed from China reported “subtle and vague, but abnormal, sensations of sound and pressure,” the Guangzhou consulate reported last month

Security guards outside the Guangzhou consulate on Thursday told reporters to leave the area and not attempt to talk to consulate staff.

Asked about the latest incidents, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said the U.S. had not formally raised the matter with Beijing.

“If the U.S. makes formal contact with us, China will continue necessary investigations in an earnest and responsible manner and maintain close communication and cooperation with the U.S.,” Hua said at a regularly scheduled news conference.

Chi na earlier said it had looked into the case announced last month but came up with no clues about the cause of the symptoms.

The New York Times identified the latest American employee evacuated as Mark A. Lenzi, a security engineering officer at the con-

sulate who left Wednesday night with his wife and two children.

Lenzi told the Times he resided in the same apartment tower as the officer evacuated in April and suffered in recent months from what he called “neurological symptoms.”

Lenzi’s apartment was in one of several high-rise buildings in The Canton Place featuring restaurants and galleries spaced around a central plaza. Another diplomat who reported symptoms was at a different upscale building near the consulate, the paper said.

A U.S. official, who wasn’t authorized to discuss the situation publicly and requested anonymity, said the evacuated American government workers were being brought from China for testing to the University of Pennsylvania. That’s where doctors have been treating and studying patients previously evacuated from the U.S. Embassy in Havana.

The preliminary findings of the medical reports on the 24 personnel affected in Cuba showed they had sensory and memory problems similar to the brain dysfunction seen with concussions.

LAM YIK FEI / NEW YORK TIMES American diplomats working at the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou, China, developed symptoms in two apartment complexes, including the Canton Place apartments (above), after a possible sonic attack.