Quick commentsGerald Epstein: No military angle to debate over small pox sample retention

Published 25 January 2011

There is an honest debate among scientists whether to destroy or retain the world’s last remaining smallpox sample; one argument that is not being made is these samples should be retained for possible use as a weapon; the assertion that some of U.S. scientists or government officials who argue for retaining the samples, do so because of the potential use of smallpox as a bioweapon, has no basis in fact; moreover, the indiscriminate spread of small pox makes it unsuitable as a weapon, since its effects could not be limited to the military forces or even the population of an attacking state

There is a debate among scientists whether to keep or destroy the few remaining samples of the smallpox virus. In a recent report in the Wall Street Journal, which the NewWire cited in an article on the issue (see “Smallpox remains a large threat and issue of contention,” 20 January 2011 HSNW), Kalyan Banerjee alleged that one of the reasons some U.S. scientists and government officials wanted to keep the small pox sample was for possible use as a bioweapon.

Banerjee, a virologist from India, former member of a WHO advisory committee on smallpox research, and now a committee adviser, said: “To put it bluntly, it [that is, retention of smallpox] is the same logic by which the superpowers continue the possession of the nuclear weapons; they wish to hold on to the smallpox virus as a super bio-weapon.”

Gerald L. Epstein, Ph.D., the director of the Center for Science, Technology and Security Policy at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), categorically rejects Banerjee’s suggestions. He made these comments to Homeland Security NewsWire (note that the AAAS does not have a position on the destruction of smallpox):

It is unfortunate that this baseless and frankly outrageous allegation is confusing what would otherwise be a legitimate debate about destruction of the last remaining smallpox samples,” said Gerald Epstein, a former official with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. “As someone who dealt with the smallpox destruction issue in the White House during the Clinton administration, and who has followed the destruction debate since then, I categorically reject the assertion that any U.S. government official who is arguing to retain smallpox samples is seeking to preserve smallpox as a deterrent weapon.”

“I have never heard any U.S. government official or former official claim — publicly or privately — that smallpox should be retained for possible use as a deterrent. Development and retention of smallpox as a retaliatory weapon would violate the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention, and the use of smallpox as a weapon in any manner — including retaliation — would violate the 1925 Geneva Protocol, both treaties that the United States is a party to and takes seriously. Even if there were no treaty constraints, smallpox does not make sense as a military weapon. Its indiscriminate spread would serve no purpose other than mass extermination, and its effects could not be limited to the military forces or even the population of an attacking state. Whatever rationale the United States might have to support retaining smallpox samples, use as a deterrent isn’t one of them — and no such allegation against the United States should be permitted to go unchallenged.”