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Ronald Bailey'sColumns The Best BioDefense is BioOffense (3/10) Happy Birthday, Love Canal (3/24) Weird Science (3/17) Earlier Columns March 31, 2004 The Best BioDefense is BioOffense Technology, not regulation, will protect us from bioterror Ronald Bailey Biologically generated superpathogens, beyond the control of medicine, are a truly horrific thought. And in an age when the West is facing enemies clearly not averse to shocking new means of warfare, they might be a horrifically realistic one. Thusly, the federal government has launched a National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity. The NSABB will be operating by this summer, according to an...

<p>New research provides more evidence that the smallpox pandemics of the Middle Ages - not the plague - left generations of people with a rare genetic defect that protects them against infection by HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.</p> <p>The findings don't appear likely to help doctors develop better AIDS treatments. But if the mutations do turn out to provide immunity from smallpox along with AIDS, that knowledge may help bioterrorism prevention efforts, says study co-author Dr. Donald Mosier.</p>

BERLIN (Reuters) - It was one of the world's most deadly plagues, and some fear it might again be unleashed on mankind if bio-terrorists could get their hands on the virus. A quarter of a century after the last known case of smallpox, scientists at a heavily-guarded installation called Vector, deep in Siberia, are still conducting research on 120 strains of the virus. Responsibility for safeguarding the stockpiles lies with men like Sergei Netesov, Vector's deputy general director. "We feel it, very heavily," the soft-spoken, bespectacled Russian scientist told Reuters in an interview at a security conference in Berlin. "We...

Letter Carriers Agree to Deliver Antibiotics to American Homes in Bioterrorist Attack 2/18/04 1:27:00 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To: National Desk Contact: Drew Von Bergen of the National Association of Letter Carriers, 202-662-2489 or vonbergen@nalc.org WASHINGTON, Feb. 18 /U.S. Newswire/ -- William H. Young, president of the 305,000-member National Association of Letter Carriers, today issued the following statement upon agreement by the Department of Homeland Security, Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Postal Service for utilization of volunteer letter carriers to deliver antibiotics to homes in the event of a catastrophic bioterrorist event: "Letter carriers deliver mail six days...

<p>An Environmental Protection Agency scientist has been questioned by the FBI about an anonymous letter accusing a colleague of plotting biowarfare in the days before the 2001 anthrax attacks.</p> <p>Agents from the FBI's anthrax task force, according to a document obtained by The Washington Times, sought information on the anonymous letter, which warned that Ayaad Assaad, an Egyptian native who works as a toxicologist at the EPA, was an anti-American "religious fanatic" with the means to unleash a bioweapons attack.</p>

Iraqi Mobile Biological Warfare Agent Production Plants Overview Coalition forces have uncovered the strongest evidence to date that Iraq was hiding a biological warfare program. * Kurdish forces in late April 2003 took into custody a specialized tractor-trailer near Mosul and subsequently turned it over to US military control.  * The US military discovered a second mobile facility equipped to produce BW agent in early May at the al-Kindi Research, Testing, Development, and Engineering facility in Mosul.  Although this second trailer appears to have been looted, the remaining equipment, including the fermentor, is in a configuration similar to the first...

CBIRF Responds to Ricin Scare, Helps Secure Federal BuildingsSubmitted by: Marine Corps NewsStory Identification Number: 2004211151659Story by Cpl. Clinton Firstbrook HEADQUARTERS MARINE CORPS WASHINGTON (Feb. 8, 2004) -- For the first time since the 2001 anthrax attacks, a team of the Marine Corps' Chemical Biological Incident Response Force was called into action Feb. 3. A 161-member team, headquartered at Indian Head, Md., responded to a call from the capitol police, after a postal worker at the Dirksen Senate Office Building found ricin in a mail sorter Feb. 2. The ricin, a highly toxic chemical derived from the castor bean,...

<p>President Bush should insist his commission investigating the performance of U.S. intelligence agencies answer this question: What did we know about Saddam's weather balloon program, and when did we know it?</p> <p>This is not a facetious suggestion.</p> <p>Mr. Bush's decision to name a commission came after the highly respected David Kay -- who resigned as director of the Iraq Survey Group, saying he didn't believe Iraq had stockpiled weapons of mass destruction -- told the Senate Armed Services Committee an outside investigation was needed.</p>

The anthrax attacks in the United States in the autumn of 2001 were a reminder that bioterrorism is no longer science fiction. These incidents, and the rapidly expanding global biotechnology industry, have redefined bioterrorism as a credible threat to security. However, the world has been slow to wake up to the new challenge. The U.S. policy to mitigate the biological weapons threat encompasses a number of initiatives, among them the national implementation of biosecurity - that is, security systems and practices to protect dangerous biological materials in legitimate research facilities from theft and sabotage. By mitigating the biological weapons threat...

He's given hundreds of flu shots over the past few months, but health officials say he isn't a doctor and they still don't know exactly what he's been injecting. It's a story you saw First on News 3. Shahid Shiekh is under police investigation after shutting down one of his clinics in Washington State. News 3 has learned that Shiekh has also operated an office in Henderson. News 3's Kori Chambers is digging deeper. It's still unclear whether this phony doctor fooled any Las Vegans. We spoke with Shiekh's attorney and asked him point blank whether the man was giving...

'Super-TB' created by scientists TB is a major world killer A virulent form of tuberculosis was created in the laboratory by experts trying to alter its genetic structure. The mutant form of the bug multiplied more quickly, and was more lethal than its natural counterpart. Researchers from the University of California at Berkeley, US, had actually been trying to disable genes and make the bacterium less deadly. "This is one of the very few hyper-virulent organisms ever created," said scientist Dr Lisa Morici. Tuberculosis is one of the world's biggest killers, and scientists are probing its genetic structure in a...

Two years after the anthrax letter attacks, senior administration officials say they have fresh concerns about the nation's vulnerability to terrorist attacks with the deadly germ. The officials said their fears had intensified in part because they now recognized that anthrax spores could be more widely dispersed than previously believed. In addition, they said, terror suspects with ties to Al Qaeda have told questioners that the group has been trying to obtain anthrax for use in attacks. One indication of concern was a secret cabinet-level "tabletop" exercise conducted last month that simulated the simultaneous release of anthrax in different types...

OTTAWA (CP) - Fear of a terrorist attack involving anthrax-laced cargo has prompted the federal government to explore the purchase of custom-tailored biological agent detectors. The contraband detection section of Canada's customs agency has invited companies to pitch products capable of screening containers and other shipments for toxic biological substances. A notice posted by the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency says the portable equipment would preferably weigh less than 28 kilograms, work in extreme temperatures and be able to quickly extract air samples from containers, packages and vehicle trunks. The aim of the $10,000 pilot project is to evaluate various...

WASHINGTON, Dec 11 (Reuters) - Most U.S. states are unprepared for a biochemical terrorist attack or other public health emergency despite increased concerns about such threats, a new state-by-state survey found on Thursday. "Are we ready or not? The answer is not," Shelley Hearne, executive director of the nonprofit health advocacy group that conducted the study, Trust for America's Health, said in a statement. "Now is the time to get serious about developing an all-hazards approach to public health to ensure we are ready for the range of possible threats we face." Just more than two years after the Sept....

WASHINGTON — Tennessee is better prepared to handle a bioterrorism attack and other health emergencies than most states, according to report released today. Tennessee tied with California, Maryland and Florida for the top score in the report by Trust for America's Health, a Washington-based nonprofit. Tennessee and the other states that topped the list met seven out of 10 public health goals measured by the Trust. Dr. Kenneth Robinson, Tennessee's health commissioner, said the state was successful because it listened to numerous health officials before establishing bioterrorism preparedness plans. "The strength of our preparedness has been predicated on excellent cooperation...

The announcement that an American biologist has tried to create more deadly types of pox viruses in order to develop countermeasures against them raises serious concerns about the lack of control over research involving dangerous pathogens. The explosion in this type of research after the terrorist and anthrax attacks of 2001 underscores the importance of developing sound oversight mechanisms to ensure that efforts designed to protect the United States against biological attacks do not themselves create new dangers. The research results announced by Mark Buller of the University of St. Louis at a recent biosecurity conference in Geneva fall squarely...

Although the investigation seems focused on the idea that the Senate powder could have been "homemade," some experts say that's improbable When the anthrax mailers penned the message, "YOU CAN NOT STOP US. WE HAVE THIS ANTHRAX," the threat included a chilling nuance that remains largely unrecognized. "ARE YOU AFRAID?" asked the attackers. "Yes," should have been the answer, according to some biodefense experts, who think that the anthrax spores mailed to Senators Thomas Daschle (D-SD) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT) in the fall of 2001 represented the state of the art in bioweapons refinement, revealing telltale clues about the source....

When we hear the word "bioterrorism," we usually imagine the unyielding security system at the Center for Disease Control, the research done on the smallpox vaccine, and the outbreaks of anthrax in the U.S. postal system. However, since 9/11, the most detrimental threat of attack still lies as close to home. The greatest danger may lie within our own universities. According to MSNBC, in an inspection of laboratories on two college campuses, the inspector general's office found that radioactive, chemical and biological agents and materials could be easily stolen from these facilities, which are lacking in both security and organization....

<p>''The greatest threat of our age," President Bush said in his remarks at London's Whitehall Palace, "is nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons in the hands of terrorists." That claim is supported by a soon-to-be released report by the U.N. al Qaeda and Taliban Sanctions Committee, which warns that it is "just a matter of time" before the terrorist group launches a chemical or biological attack. While the U.S. government has taken a number of needed steps toward meeting the threat of biological weapons, it still has a long way to go.</p>

The first test in humans of an experimental vaccine against the deadly Ebola virus began yesterday, government scientists said. The vaccine, administered by injection, was designed to try to prevent outbreaks of the lethal hemorrhagic fever where it occurs naturally in Africa. It is also a bid to thwart any efforts to use the highly infectious virus as a bioterrorist agent. As part of a standard three-stage process, the first phase involves testing the vaccine's safety. Scientists also plan to measure immune responses among volunteers receiving the shots. No effective treatment exists against the viral infection, which kills up to...