Worries about CDC pathogen handling

can cause disease both in humans and animals, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has secondary inspection authority. Despite accompanying CDC inspectors on evaluations of the Atlanta lab building housing the duct-taped Q fever door, Department of Agriculture (USDA) spokeswoman Rachel Iadicicco said that agency’s inspectors were not aware of the use of duct tape. “We will discuss this with CDC,” she said.

Ebright said duct-taping a door adjacent to Q fever experiments with mice “raises very serious concerns about management. And those concerns are particularly important when one bears in mind this facility will ultimately be handling a full range of lethal pathogens - up to and including smallpox.” The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, has warned of the importance of door seals in two recent reports on the safety of the nation’s high-containment laboratories. “Because they are intended to contain dangerous microorganisms, usually in liquid or aerosol form, even minor structural defects — such as cracks in the wall, leaky pipes, or improper sealing around doors — can have severe consequences,” said Nancy Kingsbury, the GAO’s managing director of applied research and methods, in written testimony to Congress last month. Ebright notes that CDC’s biosafety standards manual states: “Seams, if present, must be sealed.” And duct tape wouldn’t appear to be adequate, he said. CDC officials said the Q fever lab is in full compliance with all rules. They said the CDC’s lab inspectors are fully aware of the duct tape. “The lab is safe, and it’s passed its inspections. But we want to make the lab even more safe and are doing so,” said Skinner. On Monday, designs were completed for a new self-sealing door to replace the one currently sealed with duct tape, said Ken Bowen, director of the CDC’s Facilities Maintenance and Engineering Office. Even though it is not required, he said, the new door is being added “as a precaution.” The construction to install the new door will begin sometime between November and next April, possibly sooner, depending on when there is a good stopping point in the experiments being conducted by the Q fever scientists.

The duct tape and the air-handling incident add to concerns about the CDC’s new lab building, said Representative John Dingell (D-Michigan), chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. His committee and the GAO have been investigating whether the post-9/11 proliferation of public and private bioterrorism labs poses public