Worries about CDC pathogen handling

At the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) new $214 million infectious disease laboratory in Atlanta, scientists are conducting experiments on bioterror bacteria in a room with a containment door sealed with duct tape. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Alison Young writes that the tape was applied around the edges of the door a year ago after the building’s ventilation system malfunctioned and pulled potentially contaminated air out of the lab and into a “clean” hallway. Nine CDC workers were tested in May 2007 for potential exposure to the Q fever bacteria being studied in the lab, CDC officials said this week in response to questions from the newspaper. The air-flow incident occurred very early in the morning, before the workday began. The blood tests were done out of an “abundance of caution,” CDC spokesman Tom Skinner said, and they showed that none of the workers who arrived after the incident were infected. Q fever, which causes high fevers and sometimes fatal heart problems, is most commonly spread when humans inhale bacteria-laden dust from contaminated animal waste. Human-to-human transmission is rare. It is classified as a potential bioterror agent because it is moderately easy to disseminate. The CDC Q fever lab’s air containment systems have since worked properly, agency officials said; the lab is safe and poses no risk to workers. The public was never at any risk because numerous security layers were in place between the lab and the outdoors, they said. Yet the duct tape remains in place. “It’s an enhancement,” said Patrick Stockton, CDC safety and occupational health manager, as he and four other agency officials took a reporter to see the door Wednesday. “We could take it off.” want answers

The CDC explanations drew skepticism from some biosafety watchdogs — especially since this is the same lab building that came under scrutiny by Congress and the Government Accountability Office (GAO) last summer after the AJC revealed the building experienced an hour-long power outage and backup generators failed to come on. “I do not believe the CDC would approve this arrangement in a laboratory other than their own,” Richard Ebright, a microbiologist and biosafety expert at Rutgers University in New Jersey, said of the taped Q fever lab door. CDC is the federal agency responsible for inspecting U.S. labs — including its own — that work with certain dangerous germs that primarily infect humans. Because the Q fever bacteria, Coxiella burnetii,