BIOTERRORISM shot way up the developed world鈥檚 agenda this year, especially in the US.
The anthrax attacks in the US in 2001 killed just five people, but there was widespread panic, Congress nearly shut down and the cost ran into billions. It was obvious the world was completely unprepared for such an event.
Afterwards, the debate began in earnest about how to prevent terrorists getting hold of deadly pathogens. 快猫短视频s were up in arms about restrictions on their freedom to work on anything they choose and to publish results, but the US rushed through half a dozen laws to control pathogens and those who handle them. This made for much uncertainty and vast amounts of red tape in 2002.
Advertisement
But the task of preventing bioweapons getting into the wrong hands keeps getting harder. In July, the world was shocked by the announcement that the polio virus had been recreated from scratch, using nothing more than its DNA blueprint, taken from the Internet, and short DNA segments bought by mail order. Genetic information was now a potential weapon. That led many, including 快猫短视频, to argue that certain genomes, such as the nearly completed blueprint for the 1918 flu virus, should not be made freely available on the Web.
The 34 nations of the Australia Group, set up to curb the spread of bioweapons, agreed in June to controls on the export of sensitive pieces of DNA. Those controls could be extended to limit what DNA sequences can be posted on the big genome databases. And despite scientists鈥� opposition, Britain passed the Export Control Bill at the end of July, requiring licences for exporting 鈥渋ntangibles鈥� that might lead to weapons of mass destruction.
Yet regulations can鈥檛 cover every eventuality. The perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax attacks, for instance, probably came from US government bioweapons labs. Increased funding is a double-edged sword 鈥� more research means more dangerous organisms and more people who know how to work with them. And 2002 has seen President Bush pour an unprecedented amount of money into biodefence.
In February, he announced the formation of the Department of Homeland Security, charged with protecting the US from threats such as bioterrorism. Out of the department鈥檚 proposed $37 billion budget, a whopping $1.75 billion was allocated to biodefence, most of it going to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). That鈥檚 the largest departmental budget increase in the history of the National Institutes of Health.
The money will go towards research into the 鈥淎 list鈥� of pathogens, including anthrax, bubonic plague and smallpox. And Washington is demanding results such as vaccines and treatments within three years.
There have been some promising developments already. A vaccine against Ebola has proved successful in tests on monkeys, for instance. More ambitious aims include developing 鈥渂road-spectrum鈥� antimicrobial drugs, and finding ways to make a vaccine quickly in response to an unknown agent.
But while the effectiveness of the Ebola vaccine can in theory be tested by giving it to health workers in parts of Africa where they might be exposed to the virus, the same isn鈥檛 true for diseases such as smallpox. So how can you approve drugs that have never been properly tested on people? The FDA is developing methods to license drugs after limited human testing 鈥� but if they don鈥檛 work we might not find out until it鈥檚 too late.
And what companies will want to make drugs and vaccines that may never be used? To get industry on board, governments may guarantee to buy stocks.
Researchers may be drooling over the influx of cash, but many are concerned that spending it on a narrow list of bioterror agents will be a waste. 鈥淭he worst 鈥榯errorist鈥� may be nature itself,鈥� says NIAID director Anthony Fauci. 鈥淚鈥檓 more worried about the next flu pandemic than a deliberate bioterrorism attack.鈥�
