Debate over private biolabs in Seattle

We have
written about the tension caused by the lure - and fear - of biolabs, both
those operated by the government and those operated by private organizations
and universities. On the one hand, building and operating such a lab, in which
research is done on the most dangerous pathogens, is an economic boon to the
community: Hundreds of well-paying jobs are created, in addition to the
benefits to local contractors from supplying the lab and sustaining it. On the
other hand, there is always fear that an accident would occur and that a deadly
pathogen would escape, wreaking death and havoc on the neighborhood and beyond.
The latest place in which a fierce debate is taking place over biolabs is Seattle, Washington. Biolabs opponents have now
proposed legislation to govern the operations of these labs in the city.

Randy
baker, an appellate lawyer in Seattle, was among community activists
who drafted the proposed biotechnology legislation. He writes in the Seattle Post-Dispatch that biolabs are playing high-tech Russian roulette. Laboratories conducting
research on lethal pathogens, often suitable for biological warfare, are
springing up all over, according to a 2007 U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO)
report. Seattle already houses at least ten ten such labs. The exact number is
unknown because the law does not require public notice. Operated by
universities, private corporations, and government, those laboratories are
intended to develop defenses against bioterrorism, pandemics such as a humanly
transmissible avian flu, incurable diseases such as ebola, and new treatments
for existing diseases. Notwithstanding their laudatory purposes, the labs,
which operate almost entirely without government regulation or public
oversight, already have had scores of accidents.:

• In 2004 at the privately
  operated Seattle Infectious Disease Research Institute, three employees
  were infected with potentially lethal aerosolized tuberculosis.
  Apparently, a containment vessel had leaked
• In 2006 at Texas A&M University’s bioresearch lab, a
  scientist was infected with brucella bacteria, which could cause serious
  heart and neurological damage. The lab had neglected to inform her that
  brucella required precautions in addition to those needed for work with
  other dangerous pathogens
• Three years ago, at Boston University’s biolab, three researchers
  working with tularemia, a potentially fatal pathogen suitable for
  biological warfare, became infected
• Last fall, foot and mouth
  virus, which can devastate livestock herds, escaped from a U.S. laboratory in England. Several hundred cattle had
  to be killed as a precaution. The virus apparently escaped through faulty
  pipes. None of those accidents was made public by the lab operator
• The 2007 GAO report indicated
  that the public safety risk posed by the labs is growing. It further noted
  “these labs represent a capability that can be misused by terrorists
  or people with malicious intent.” Clearly, continued self-regulation
  by the labs is simply high-tech Russian roulette.

As we
note above, Baker is behind a proposed legislation which would require that
laboratories using dangerous pathogens obtain a permit, disclose the pathogens
they would house, how they will be contained, stored, and disposed of, and
identify the individuals responsible. It mandates appropriate staff training,
and plans for evacuation and coordination with local authorities in case of an
accident. Research on the most dangerous pathogens, such as ebola and smallpox,
which are deadly, incurable and highly contagious, would be prohibited. To
ensure it actually is enforced, the proposal mandates the public body issuing
permits include people with no ties to the labs, their investors or their
research projects. It also mandates compliance at each laboratory be supervised
by a biosafety committee, whose members include people unconnected to the lab
and living nearby. The proposed law requires prompt public disclosure of all
incidents in which there was a reasonable possibility of human exposure and/or
release of pathogens. Finally, it includes penalties for violations to deter
noncompliance. “Unless we regulate biotechnology research, and ensure it
proceeds under public scrutiny, it is likely to cause precisely the sort of
harm from which it is supposed to protect us,” Baker concludes.