Slashdot Mirror
High Security Animal Disease Lab Faces Uncertain Future
Dupple writes in with a story about the uncertain future of a proposed bio lab in the heart of cattle country. "Plans to build one of the world's most secure laboratories in the heart of rural America have run into difficulties. The National Bio and Agro defense facility (NBAF) would be the first US lab able to research diseases like foot and mouth in large animals. But reviews have raised worries about virus escapes in the middle of cattle country. For over fifty years the United States has carried out research on dangerous animal diseases at Plum Island, just off the coast of New York. However after 9/11 the Department of Homeland Security raised concerns about the suitability of the location and its vulnerability to terrorist attack."
I know people that work on plum island. They say that the place will be open till at least 2021. The decision to move it was purely political. At the time the local governments did not want a level 4 facility on the island, Once it was announced that the research would be moved to Kansas they recanted. There has also been much discussion about the wisdom of moving it to the middle of tornado alley and cattle country. Terrorism has had little effect on the decision, an island makes it very easy to control who comes and goes as compared to a facility reachable by foot. It would not surprise me to see them upgrade Plum island and cancel the project in Kansas, on the other hand it is up to the usual political backroom deals.
The Lunatick, Carpe Corpus!
The scientists owe it to the people there to reduce the risk of an escaped pathogen by as much as they can. Once they do that, there really shouldn't be anything to complain about--it would just be pure, irrational fear from what I can see.
Arguably, siting the lab in the middle of a giant supply of natural hosts for the pathogens being studied is a massive failure of risk reduction, no matter how many sci-fi airlocks they pencil in...
I'm sure that security is better where God and the County Sheriff are packing.
Even a rather large virus will spatter like an overripe melon if hit with a mere .000012 caliber round. The real trick is in the aiming...
Yes, if the security is perfect then there is no problem. In the same vein, putting it on an island near NY is completely safe as long as NY doesn't get hit by Tsunami or terrorist/millitary attacks. Yet they are speculating about placing it in the middle of the country precisely because you can't expect things to go alrgiht forever.
Part of the question then is, what is more likely? Disseases escaping containment procedures or a cataclysmic event devastating NY? Before 9/11 or Sandy (and I'd wager Sandy is the real kicker here) such pondering would seem the stuff of Science Fiction. But considering this AGW problem is here to stay, you can only expect worse storms to come in the future. Relocating the lab to the iddle of the country seems like a better idea right now.
My question here is, don't you guys have lots and lots of dessertic zones? Just put it there. Or is it packed already with too many secret millitary bases?
But... the future refused to change.
Disease escape is a far more likely failure mode than terrorist attack. Microbes have evolved over millions of years to be easy to spread.
In terms of terrorist attack, New York is on the eastern seaboard not far from Washington DC. A relatively close radius should contain: half of the US Navy's Atlantic fleet, huge amounts of coast guard assets, thousands of FBI agents, and a pretty massive city police presence. No where else in America is safer.
The scientists owe it to the people there to reduce the risk of an escaped pathogen by as much as they can. Once they do that, there really shouldn't be anything to complain about--it would just be pure, irrational fear from what I can see.
Arguably, siting the lab in the middle of a giant supply of natural hosts for the pathogens being studied is a massive failure of risk reduction, no matter how many sci-fi airlocks they pencil in...
What if terrorists bring erasers and pencil them out.
I've heard that one of the more difficult aspects of working in a level 4 lab is learning not to catch things that are falling, such as scalpels, and that when the scientists go home after work, they don't catch tableware and glasses and such, leading to much domestic strife.
(I don't know how true it is, but it seems to make sense.)
This nearly literal pork-barrel facility (which is already built, BTW) is about a quarter mile up the street of the main campus of Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas. It is however, within eyesight of the a) football stadium, b) basketball coliseum, and c) student recreational center. Bonus: just to the west of all of that is the only hospital in the city. Not that animal diseases *ever* jump to humans...
This was all mainly due to one of the worst US Senators in the modern age: Pat Roberts. His other claim to fame was putting off the investigations of the Iraq invasion lies until after the elections to 'take politics out of it'. After the election, he then claimed there was no point in investigating the lies as the past is the past, spilt milk, etc. Scumbag.