THE PROPOSAL to move the government laboratory that does research with live foot-and-mouth disease virus from an island off the East Coast to an inland site — perhaps even to Kansas State University — requires careful consideration of the risks.
Members of Congress, including Kansas Sen. Pat Roberts, are already lining up to try to get the lab for their states. Their thinking seems to be that the money spent to build the lab and run it and the jobs it would provide would be an unalloyed blessing to the state chosen.
But the potential dangers posed by the lab are too great to allow site selection to be influenced in any way by considerations of politics or economic development. The foot-and-mouth virus — deadly to cattle and other animals — is highly contagious and hardy. If it escaped from the lab, it could wreak havoc regionally or nationally.
The first consideration in choosing a site and designing a lab must be security. Security is not just a matter of keeping the virus safely in the lab, but of considering what would happen if the virus escaped. No containment system is foolproof and no human plan is perfect.
An important question for people designing such places is always “What if we are wrong?”
What happens if the virus escapes from the lab? It is not an idle question. The Associated Press reports that the virus did escape from a lab in Great Britain last year, causing an outbreak of the disease.
Given the possibility of an outbreak, does it make sense to place the lab in the middle of the American cattle industry?
Just as it would not be wise to do research on Ebola virus in the middle of New York City, it is not wise to study a live foot-and-mouth virus in the middle of cattle country.
Opposing putting the lab in Kansas — or at any site near large concentrations of cattle — is not a matter of “not in my backyard.”
It is a matter of common sense.
Patrick S. Kelley
Editorial Page Editor
pwitt14 (anonymous) says...
Great logic! The Centers for Disease Control is in Atlanta near lots of people, so let's shut that down too. Who needs research?! Let's just pretend we're back in the 1940s with no modern technology for lab safety!
April 14, 2008 at 5:34 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
SpamGangrene (anonymous) says...
Or better yet, lets leave it on an island, where it currently is, which will make it much less likely to infect livestock.
I'm not sure why the administration is so hot to move this thing inland, unless they figure that the island won't be viable for much longer due to the inevitability of rising sea levels.
April 14, 2008 at 6:41 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
jeksdairy (anonymous) says...
Mr. Kelley, do your research. High level bio research is already done safely and securely in labs in our major cities, like Chicago, Boston and Atlanta. Plum Island is an aging facility that after 50 years has yet to develop a vaccine for FMD. As a rancher, I support research at a modern facility on the mainland to treat and prevent these diseases. As you preach NIMBY, our industry supports safe and secure research and Kansas is the best place for it. We know agriculture, and we have the largest concentration of animal health research in the world already here..we are the experts.
April 14, 2008 at 7:35 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
kreimers (anonymous) says...
SpamGangrene's comments reminded me of those picante sauce ads with cowboys blasting other products made in New York City...remember? Well guess what those east coasters don't understand animal diseases either. Your own paper put it best from John Schlageck in 2007: 'When it comes to intellectual and physical assets, Kansas has a rich history of embracing and leading innovation. Our agricultural heritage, combined with a smart workforce, academic resources, transportation infrastructure and public and private support make Kansas well suited for the challenges of a national project focused on public health and the safety and security of our national food supply.
As far the threat of an outbreak: 'These facilities are safe both for the general public and laboratory researchers, according to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease. To date there are no recorded incidents involving community contamination form any of the existing facilities in the United States.'
Of greater concern is the threat of agro-terrorism. Such an incident would lead to an economic collapse that would make Katrina look like a car accident. We can get this one right and a modern facility in Kansas, where we know animal research, is the right start.
April 14, 2008 at 8:30 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
alfalfa (anonymous) says...
I am a cattleman, I was in the UK during the last F and M outbreak, the farmers there immediately asked one question when it became clear it had come from a laboratory, "why were they doing this research there". Anyone in the livestock business had better think twice about supporting this thing right in the middle of cattle country. Yes, it may create a couple hundred jobs, but it is an unneeded risk to us in the cattle business, that cannot be denied, and while the risk may not be large, it still is significant.
The movement restrictions placed on British livestock resulted in the loss of millions of dollars, not to farmers who had infected livestock, but those all over the country who didn't have the disease. Their stock couldn't be moved and was for all practical purposes was worthless for over 3 months, yet it still had to be fed.
If everyone is hell bent on putting it in Manhattan, fine. But post a bond in the range of about $100 million so if this unlikely leak ever occurs, the rest of us who weren't for it won't lose everything. Better yet, do the intelligent thing and put it where there are few livestock to infect, then it will never be an issue. The United Kingdom is not a third world nation, they have more restrictive regulations for animal health than we do, yet they still had a leak, due to human error during a remodeling project at the Pirbright lab. If it can happen there, it can happen here.
April 14, 2008 at 10:19 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )