Been sleeping well lately? This Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists article by Defense Tech pal Nick Schwellenbach should take care of that.
It’s on a subject we worry about a whole lot here at Defense Tech HQ — the ginormous growth in biodefense research, and how the hell to maintain safety amidst that growth. For example, 97 percent of the folks receivng National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) grants for biodefense research hadn’t touched the bugs before 9/11, Nick notes.
No wonder three Boston University lab workers were infected with tularemia, or rabbit fever, back in January. “Things like that happen when people are not trained well,” explained NIAID Director Anthony Fauci.
And those infections went down at a relatively low-risk, “BSL-2″ lab. What happens when the school’s BSL-4 facility — designed to handle killers like Ebola — gets up and running?
Take an ambien, for starters.
(PopSci has more nightmare fodder here)
Biolabs Metastasize
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{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
Clean rooms and laminar flow benches are no more cleaner than the workers dicipline and awareness of the hazzards being worked upon. DRILL,DRILL, THE SAFETY BASICS until they become as natural as a reflex,for the lab techs. Develope slide shows to educate all who work at or in the labs.
A well developed micro forensic slide show will go a long way to implant in to everyones mind the need for alertness at the work station.
Posted by Paul Heffernan,06/21/05
Clean rooms and laminar flow benches are no more cleaner than the workers dicipline and awareness of the hazzards being worked upon. DRILL,DRILL, THE SAFETY BASICS until they become as natural as a reflex,for the lab techs. Develope slide shows to educate all who work at or in the labs.
A well developed micro forensic slide show will go a long way to implant in to everyones mind the need for alertness at the work station.
Posted by Paul Heffernan,06/21/05
Clean rooms and laminar flow benches are no more cleaner than the workers dicipline and awareness of the hazzards being worked upon. DRILL,DRILL, THE SAFETY BASICS until they become as natural as a reflex,for the lab techs. Develope slide shows to educate all who work at or in the labs.
A well developed micro forensic slide show will go a long way to implant in to everyones mind the need for alertness at the work station. (prevent cross contamination,by good habits)
Posted by Paul Heffernan,06/21/05
the reason for these problems is that the CDC NIH Safety Guidelines for BSL Labs are just that–not true regulations.
distroy these room why your problem it`s contamination and an incinerate all material no`t uses after the perssonal re-training and re-training and then biuld a new room esterilisate and hermetic im from mexico city
These are all great ideas but my main concern is who has access to all these “bugs” The last thing we need is a security breach and some fanatical terrorist dumbass goes and releases or sells that crap on Ebay. I think security and clearance of personnel should be the top priority at bioweapon/bioresearch facilities.
when I was growing up(now66) my parents an M>D & R.N. along with the nursing training and cooking training in the USAF goal was to teach in my words that “cleanliness is next to godliness” & everything should be cleaned so that you can eat off it from flors to ceilings if this conept is “drilled” in to all;top to bottom personel there wouldn’t be fear of accidents.
We cannot afford to be lax here. Good comments above. Let’s stay heads up and pay attention, this stuff is not funny and it can get all to serious all to quick. No sense in taking unnecessary risks. Play it smart. Think on this.
I used to work in the nuclear power industry, which has an extensive program, mandated by Nuclear Regulatory Commission Regulations, to deal with the insider threat.
The most serious problem we have with biolab security is 1. training and re-training. The suggestions previously listed nail that one pretty well. 2. As a secondary requirement ongoing monitoring of personnel who work with killer bugs is needed.
In the nuclear power industry individuals are monitored. Periodcally they are interviewed by their supervisors. EVERYTHING is fair game, how much are you drinking, how’s your marriage, are you indebt — how much. If an employee suddenly gets a couple of speeding tickets, his boss whats to know why, what’s the cause of the instability. The employee will be taken out of the control room and shifted to a non-critical job until a subsequent review allows him back in the room. We used to joke that Ted Kennedy’s drinking and wreckless driving didn’t mean much for being a Senator, but it meant that he could never get a job as a nuclear plant operator.
While this may seem excessive, it has been standard operating procedure in the nuclear industry for decades. I recommend it for who work with dangerous pathogens.
The Govt. must step in a regulate these ventures very closely, especially in this day and age of worlwide terorrism. It seems kind of ironic that a person can get in big trouble if your car is not environmentally compliant, but yet you can have a bunch of nimrods running around playing with bio germs and virus’s virtually unchecked. The way to play it safe is to not let it happen in the first place unlesss it’s sanctioned by the Govt. Just because this is America with it’s free enterprise system, that doesn’t give anyone the right to endanger the larger population with some enterprising adventure that could potentially wipeout mankind.
Shut those down that are not specifically working on government sanctioned and regulated projects. Come on America – -wake up before it’s too late.
Well said, all!
It is critical that the rapidly expanding BSL3 & 4 labs are not “regulated” and threatened with prospective fines for past deficits by an external, partisan agency.
Instead, these mission-critical labs need a dynamic, state-of-the-art
RE: “More Biolabs to NV, UT, CO, WY area.
Or share with Yukon Territ, Canada?”
These labs need to able to recruit and retain the BEST researchers (and their families). I think remote locations would not support this, plus provide a false sense of security.
Accidents happen 99.99% of the time WITHIN the lab – whether it is in the Yukon or Boston.
In the Beach City is such fearfulness, I am owning many Archlord money in my pocket.
In order to make a little bit of hundreds of thousands of eve isk, I commanded all of the staff hung up the number on the computer, and help me mine the mining.