Suspect white powder harmless

Medical insurer Southern Cross began opening a backlog of 5000 letters yesterday afternoon after receiving confirmation that a mail-drop of suspicious white power was harmless.

Hundreds of workers were cleared from a 21-storey inner Auckland office building on Friday and three female employees of Southern Cross subsidiary Activa taken to hospital for tests after the powder spilled from an envelope which arrived in the mail.

They were sent home six hours later, but the insurance group kept its mailrooms closed in all its Auckland buildings and warned staff not to open any correspondence until the powder was identified.