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 When the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last week
unveiled a report documenting multiple safety breaches at its labs,
its director for the first time suggested the country turn back the
rapid-fire proliferation of such research units, which have tripled
in little more than a decade to at least 1,500.
"One of the things that we want to do is reduce the number of
laboratories that work with dangerous agents to the absolute minimum
necessary," said CDC Director Dr Thomas Frieden. "Reduce the number
of people who have access to those laboratories to the absolute
minimum necessary. Reduce the number of dangerous pathogens we work
with."
His remarks may vindicate the views of a small group of biosafety
and biosecurity experts who see that as the only way to protect
dangerous viruses and bacteria from both lab accidents and thefts.
They point to an alarming rise in the number of incidents of lost or
escaped microbes from such labs in recent years and see the CDC
cases as proof that even the best facilities are vulnerable.
Following through on this idea would require a wholesale shift in
U.S. biodefense policy, which spans preparedness for disease
outbreaks and for the use of biological agents in terror attacks.
While the CDC and U.S. Department of Agriculture are responsible for
registering labs that work with "select agents" - microbes and
poisons that could be used as bioweapons – they cannot rescind that
approval unless there has been a clear violation of the rules for
handling those microbes. "Just as with domestic spying by the
National Security Agency, drone attacks and a long list of other
things, the White House seems to feel it must maintain the policies
of the last administration or risk being called weak on homeland
security," said molecular biologist Richard Ebright of Rutgers
University.
 TESTING DEADLY POWDERS
According to a 2013 report by the Government Accountability Office,
the investigative arm of Congress, 415 labs had registered with the
CDC or the USDA in 2004 to work with select agents. By 2010, the
number had grown to 1,495, the GAO found.
That was intentional.
In 2001, anthrax stolen from a federal bioweapons lab killed five
people and sickened 17 more. At the time, only two U.S. labs were
capable of identifying anthrax in samples of mysterious powders,
which "were flowing in by the thousands," said epidemiologist D.A.
Henderson, a distinguished scholar at the University of Pittsburgh
Medical Center.
Henderson was tapped by the federal government to vastly increase
the number of such labs, both to detect suspected pathogens like
anthrax and to conduct biodefense research, such as developing
vaccines.
"We had more white powder coming out of more places than you can
possibly imagine," he said. "The number of powdered donuts that got
subjected to testing, I'd hate to think."
As a result, "there was a rush to get more BSL-3 and BSL-4
facilities," he said, referring to the highest levels of biosafety.
"Universities were anxious to build them," since the work brought
millions of dollars in funding as well as prestige.
A decade later, the country had spent $19 billion on biodefense
research. But there has been no national assessment of how many such
labs are needed for security, the GAO found.
"Increasing the number of (such) laboratories," it concluded,
"increases the aggregate national risk" because of the chances of
intentional or accidental escape.
It also increases the number of individuals with federal approval to
work with select agents. With the additional spending, the number of
people with access to bioweapons agents also "increased by a factor
of 20 to 40," said Ebright.
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According to a 2012 report by CDC scientists, there were 16
incidents of lost or escaped microbes from select-agent labs in
2004, meaning everything from misplaced samples to an infected
researcher walking out the door harboring a virus. That rose to 128
in 2008 and 269 in 2010. "It is almost exactly two per week and
accelerating," said epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch of Harvard School
of Public Health, and suggests that staff training, physical
measures, and other elements of biosafety are failing more often
rather than less.
 HOW MANY LABS?
The CDC's anthrax breach, plus its mishandling of a highly
pathogenic flu virus also revealed last week, show that even the
most respected labs can violate protocols in potentially dangerous
ways. It therefore makes no sense for the United States to have a
dozen BSL-4 labs, which work with pathogens that are easily
transmitted by air between people (anthrax is not contagious and so
is handled in BSL-3 labs) and cause severe or fatal diseases for
which there are no vaccines or treatments, said biologist Lynn
Klotz, a member of the Scientists' Working Group on Chemical and
Biological Weapons.
"At minimum, these labs should be in a remote, rural area," said
Klotz. "That way, if there is a mechanical failure and something
gets out, there is much less risk of harm." He and others say
several high-security labs should be candidates for closing.
After years of litigation, Boston University received permission
from city, state, and federal authorities this year to open a BSL-4
lab in the city's densely populated South End, but critics consider
it a prime example of a facility whose potential contribution to
research is swamped by the risks of exposing a large urban area to
an escaped pathogen. Other labs targeted by both scientists and
community members include the National Bio- and Agrodefense Facility
in Manhattan, Kansas, partly because it is located in a tornado zone
and will work with pathogens that could devastate the cattle
industry.
Some experts argue that having fewer labs is not the solution, and
that improving adherence to safety protocols makes more sense. To
many, however, it is simple mathematics: the fewer labs working with
nature's most dangerous microbes, the lower the probability of an
escape.
"Reducing the number of labs may help better police the remaining
ones," said Michael Osterholm of the University of Minnesota, a
member of the National Scientific Advisory Board for Biosecurity,
which advises the government.
The first chance to gauge any political support for that option may
come this week, when CDC's Frieden testifies before a House
subcommittee about the anthrax and flu releases. "I'm sure there
will be many changes to come," said biosafety consultant Debra
Sharpe. "I just hope they will be well thought out and not knee-jerk
fixes for political expediency."
(Reporting by Sharon Begley in New York and Julie Steenhuysen in
Chicago; Editing by Michele Gershberg, Peter Henderson and Eric
Walsh)
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