BSL-4 Lab Worker - Photo Credit –USAMRIID
# 6214
As blogger fodder, one could hardly ask for a better controversy than the current row over mutating the H5N1 virus in the lab to create a `better pathogen’.
Something that, while only recently making headlines, has been a goal of a number of labs around the world for several years (see here, here, and here for examples).
But with the apparent success of Ron Fouchier’s ferret experiments in the Netherlands, the hypothetical has suddenly become a reality (see Katherine Harmon’s Sci-Am article & New Scientist: Five Easy Mutations), instantly setting off alarm bells in the biosecurity world.
Fouchier’s, (and almost simultaneously) Professor Yoshihiro Kawaoka’s in Wisconsin, announcement that they had created mammalian adapted and transmissible strains of the avian H5N1 virus have unleashed a firestorm of controversy.
And as a flu blogger, you’d think I’d be at least a little bit happy about all this.
After all, I don’t have a financial stake in the outcome, and it provides fresh and controversial content nearly every day.
We’ve got the highly explosive issue of scientific and academic freedom versus concerns over public safety and biosecurity.
And if that were not enough, we’ve some of the biggest names in virology and influenza research engaged in public, and at time vigorous, debate.
It would seem like a win-win from my perspective.
But it isn’t.
As I wrote several weeks ago in Science at the Crossroads, the public’s trust in science is in serious decline, and some of the blame for that surely lies in the conduct of the scientific community.
Quite frankly, this confusing (and often unseemly) debate over bird flu research we’ve witnessed these past few months hasn’t done much to help matters.
Of particular concern across much of flublogia have been attempts to recast the H5N1 virus as being not much worse than seasonal flu, and the sudden revision by Ron Fouchier of his research results (see ASM BioDefense Meeting Video Now Online).
Earlier this week Laurie Garrett took aim at this `kinder and gentler’ version of Fouchier’s ferret research (see Laurie Garrett Blogs On The H5N1 Research Controversy).
And yesterday, Helen Branswell weighed in with a report of her own, where she interviews a number of well-respected researchers who also express concerns over how this debate is progressing.
If you haven’t already done so, I’d invite you to read:
The Canadian Press - ONLINE EDITION
Scientists fear row over bird flu studies may undermine credibility of the field
By: Helen Branswell, The Canadian Press
TORONTO - As influenza scientists and biosecurity experts continue to do battle over controversial bird flu studies, some in the flu world worry arguments being used to push for full publication of the studies may be eroding the credibility of the field.
We are entering a new era of scientific discovery, one where great things are possible – particularly in the life sciences fields. Bio-engineering, many scientists believe, could revolutionize the world.
But those advances will be for naught if the public loses faith in the science, or the scientists.
You can create a genetically modified dengue-resistant mosquito, but if the public fears it more than the disease, all you have is an expensive laboratory curiosity.
And a universal flu vaccine – one that could forever stave off the global threat of influenza pandemics -only works if it is accepted by the vast majority of the public as being safe, effective, and necessary.
No one expects science to always get it right, or for scientists to always agree. In fact, the disagreements are what propel scientific research and advance our knowledge.
But how these disagreements are publically handled - and how difficult concepts such as uncertainty and risk in conducting life science research are presented to the public - will determine whether science ultimately manages to keep hold of the public’s trust.
And that’s a prize that science can ill afford to lose.
