Referral : Laurie Garrett Shares A Word About H7N9

 

# 8071

 

 

Laurie Garrett, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist (1996 for her series on Ebola) and  author of several books (including The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance, I heard The Sirens Scream), takes a few minutes in her blog to discuss the frustrations in China – and elsewhere – over the inability to pin down the exact source of the H7N9 virus, and how that is affecting surveillance and prevention efforts.

Follow the link to read:

A word about the H7N9 influenza

Posted on December 13, 2013 by Laurie Garrett

Laurie Garrett On Biosecurity Reforms

BSL-4 Lab Worker - Photo Credit –USAMRIID  

 

# 7992

 

Beginning in the fall of 2011 and extending well into the summer of 2012, the global scientific community was roiled by controversy over the wisdom of conducting – and publishing – Gain of Function (GOF) research on the avian H5N1 virus.

 

Objections were raised initially after the 2011 ESWI Influenza Conference in Malta, where Dutch researcher Ron Fouchier revealed that he’d created a more `transmissible’ form of the H5N1 virus (New Scientist: Five Easy Mutations). That discovery, along with similar news coming from Yoshihiro Kawaoka, a highly respected virologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine, set alarm bells ringing in the biosecurity community.

 

By December of 2011 The Biosecurity Debate On H5N1 Research reached a creshendo, which resulted in a group of internationally renowned Scientists to Announce a 60 Day Moratorium On Some H5N1 Research in January, 2012. That moratorium was subsequently extended until January of 2013 (see NIH Statement On Lifting Of The H5N1 Research Moratorium).

 

In the meantime, after much heated debate, last summer Science Published The Fouchier Ferret Study and Nature Published The Kawaoka H5N1 Study

. 

In March of 2012 the NIH - which funds many of these research projects - promulgated new DURC Oversight Rules (Dual Use Research of Concern), which also includes some types of GOF research. For those unfamiliar with the lexicon of biomedical research, DURC in this new policy is defined as:

 

. . . life sciences research that, based on current understanding, can be reasonably anticipated to provide knowledge, information, products, or technologies that could be directly misapplied to pose a significant threat with broad potential consequences to public health and safety, agricultural crops and other plants, animals, the environment,

 

Since then the debate has continued, often contentiously, over what restrictions (if any) should be placed on potentially dangerous gain of function research.  A few recent blogs on those debates include:

 

H7N9: Reigniting The `Gain Of Function’ Research Debate

Nature: H5N1 viral-engineering dangers will not go away

Morens & Taubenberger - Influenza Viruses: Breaking All the Rules

 

While we’ve been primarily concerned over GOF (Gain of Function) influenza research, the implications of this revolution in biology go far beyond influenza research.  It is now possible for even small laboratories to genetically engineer new (albeit, simple) life forms.

 

Today, Laurie Garrett - Pulitzer-prize winning journalist (1996 for her series on Ebola) and  author of 3 books (including The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance), and Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations - has published a  Policy Innovation Memorandum on this revolution in the emerging  `life sciences’ field,  and the biosecurity controls she believes are needed.

Follow the link to read:

 

Making the New Revolutions in Biology Safe

Author: Laurie Garrett
October 2013

Two new revolutions in biology—gain-of-function research and synthetic biology—are forcing policymakers to rethink current national and international surveillance and regulatory systems, and any resolution will require international buy-in since the threat entails all living organisms.

(Continue . . . )

 

 

I suspect few would argue against the call to  restore disease surveillance and response funding to the CDC and USDA, or the need to `harmonize global laboratory and biosecurity standards’ .  A biosecurity Level 3+ lab in India or China really ought to have the same safety standards as one operating in Japan, or Australia, or the United States. 

 

The tougher nut to crack will be developing a suitable `regulatory framework appropriate to the DURC conundrum’ .  

 

While I expect there will be opposition to additional governmental oversight, a failure to come up with clear, concise, and workable rules will (at the very least) leave the scientific community open to continual criticism (like this Editorial in the New York Times called An Engineered Doomsday) every time a new DURC or GOF research project is proposed or published.   And in a worse-case scenario, could lead to dangerous a biological release.

 

Given the stakes, it will be interesting to see how researchers, and regulators, will respond to Ms. Garrett’s proposals.

Laurie Garrett Dissects The Rationale For H5N1 Research

 

BSL-4 Lab Worker - Photo Credit –USAMRIID

 

# 6237

 

 

Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and author Laurie Garrett has a new blog up today where she once again takes a hard look at the H5N1 research controversy (see The Furor Over H5N1 Research Continues), and this time dissects the rationale being offered by scientists for doing these types of experiments.

 

Follow the link below to read:

 

Rationales for Man-made H5N1 Experiments Evaporating?

 

You can read some of her earlier takes on this controversy at the following links:

 

Laurie Garrett Blogs On The H5N1 Research Controversy

Laurie Garrett: Keeping Superbugs Away From Terrorists

Referral: Laurie Garrett On The Bird Flu Research Controversy

Laurie Garrett Blogs On The H5N1 Research Controversy

 

# 6205

 

 

Laurie Garrett, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist (1996 for her series on Ebola) and author of 3 books (including The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance), takes on a subject which has perplexed many of us in Flublogia over the past week:

The `kinder and gentler’ version of Ron Fouchier’s ferret experiments presented at last week’s ASM BioDefense panel discussion (see ASM BioDefense Meeting Video Now Online).

 

At the time I noted:

 

In a bit of a surprise, Erasmus University researcher Ron Fouchier characterized the results of his experiments somewhat differently than we’ve seen in the past.

 

While the mutated virus could be spread via the aerosol route between ferrets, Fouchier reassured, "Our data suggests this virus spreads very poorly."

 

Fouchier also downplayed the pathogenicity of virus, stating that ferrets infected this way only suffered mild illness (it required direct deep-lung inoculation to produce death/severe illness).

 

“It is not highly lethal if ferrets start coughing and sneezing to one another”, he said.

 

 

With the research currently restricted to a small group of scientists and policy makers, it makes it very difficult for anyone on the outside to make sense of all of this.

 

But Laurie Garrett isn’t just anyone. 

 

Today she takes a hard look at this reversal, and other attempts to characterize the H5N1 virus as `far less pathogenic than feared’, in her blog.

At this point I’ll wisely step aside and invite you to read:

 

Much Ado About What? The H5N1 Story Gets Murkier Every Day

Laurie Garrett Blogs On The H5N1 Research Controversy

 

 

# 6156

 

 

Laurie Garrett, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist (1996 for her series on Ebola) and  author of 3 books (including The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance), has been writing extensively these past couple of months about the H5N1 research controversy.

I mentioned earlier essays of hers here and here, and she was part of the NYAS discussion panel on this research earlier this month which you can view at the following link:

 

"Dual Use Research: H5N1 Influenza Virus and Beyond" Panel Sparks Lively Debate

 

This week Garrett has also been blogging extensively while technical talks were held in Geneva over the fate of the Fouchier and Kawaoka research papers.

 

She is roughly at the halfway point of what she expects will be a weeklong series.   You can access all of them at her blog.

 

As of this posting, the following essays are up:

 

 The Man-made H5N1 Controversy Heats Up: What Next? (Part One)

 The Man-made H5N1 Controversy Heats Up: What Next? (Part Two)

 The Man-made H5N1 Controversy Heats Up: What Next? (Part Three A)

 The Man-made H5N1 Controversy Heats Up: What Next? (Part Three B)

The Man-made H5N1 Controversy Heats Up: What Next? (Part Four)

Laurie Garrett: Keeping Superbugs Away From Terrorists

 

 

# 6064

 

 

As the debate over policing scientific research to prevent potentially dangerous information from getting into the hands of terrorists heats up, we’ve another commentary today from Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and author Laurie Garrett.

 

You may recall that Ms. Garrett weighed in on this topic in mid-December (see Referral: Laurie Garrett On The Bird Flu Research Controversy).

 

Although the focus is currently on H5N1 research (and its potential for bioterrorism) these issues are hardly new, nor are they restricted to influenza.

 

From a 100 percent lethal form of mousepox developed by Australian researchers in 2001, to the use of reverse genetics to create reassortant influenza viruses, scientists around the globe are increasingly able to tweak and genetically manipulate pathogens in the laboratory.

 

I’ve blogged often on (legitimate and important) research projects to create reassortant (and potentially deadlier or more transmissible) viruses for study in the laboratory.

 

Last July in H5N1: A Rite Of Passage we looked at how serial passage studies are conducted, and at one in particular that appeared in the Journal of Animal and Veterinary Advances that looked at increases in pathogenicity (in mice) of two H5N1 viruses after six serial passages in quail.

 

Another study published that month, profiled in PNAS: Reassortment Potential Of Avian H9N2, we looked at the reassortment potential of the avian H9N2 virus and H1N1.

 

And in Study: Reassorted H1N1-H5N1 Produced Virulent Strain, we looked at work conducted by researchers at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital who created several reassortant 2009 pH1N1 viruses with individual genes borrowed from a 1997 H5N1 virus.

 

 

Rapid advances in scientific knowledge and technology over the past decade now enable even small labs to do the kind of research once thought impossible. Added to that, the internet facilitates private, back channel sharing of information like never before.

 

With this proliferation and decentralization of scientific research and technology come many thorny problems to address.

 

Prime among them is whether it is desirable (or even possible) in today’s digitally interconnected world to restrict access to - or the pursuit of - potentially dangerous scientific knowledge.

 

Follow the link to read Ms. Garrett’s commentary on this complex, and difficult topic:

 

 

 

Laurie Garrett: Keeping superbugs away from terrorists

LAURIE GARRETT | senior fellow for global health, Council on Foreign Relations | Posted: Wednesday, January 11, 2012 4:00 am

 

 

 

A reminder, tomorrow at 3PM EST Science Magazine will hold a one hour online chat on science and censorship (see ScienceLive Chat On H5N1 Research And Censorship).

Referral: Laurie Garrett On The Bird Flu Research Controversy

BSL-4 Lab Worker - Photo Credit –USAMRIID

 

# 6013

 

 

Laurie Garrett, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist (1996 for her series on Ebola) and  author of 3 books (including The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance), has a long and worthwhile article published on the Foreign Policy website today on the controversy over genetic experimentation with the H5N1 virus.

 

In attempts to learn what evolutionary steps are necessary for the H5N1 bird flu virus to mutate into a pandemic strain, scientists around the world have been working to create new laboratory strains and testing them for biological fitness and virulence.

 

Last September, one of the best known researchers in the world - Ron Fouchier of Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam - revealed at a scientific conference that he’d managed to turn H5N1 into a virulent, and easily transmissible (among ferrets, anyway) pathogen.

 

(You can read about this work in Katherine Harmon’s Sci-Am article and in a follow up to this story in New Scientist: Five Easy Mutations.)

While still unpublished, there are growing concerns over the wisdom of conducting research like this, and its eventual publication.

 

Some fear that this knowledge could be used by bioterrorists to engineer a bio-weapon (see NPR: Bio-Terrorism Concerns Over Bird Flu Research).

 

Erasmus University provided their side of this discussion late last month, which I blogged on in The Bird Flu Research Debate Continues.

 

Over the past month the debate has intensified, and today Laurie Garrett adds her voice to the mix.

 

I’ll just step aside and invite you to read:

 

The Bioterrorist Next Door

Man-made killer bird flu is here.  Can -- should -- governments try to stop it?

BY LAURIE GARRETT | DECEMBER 15, 2011