The Center for Biosecurity of UPMC has launched the Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Initiative, a competitive program that will develop and maintain a network of promising early career professionals from multiple disciplines who are considering future careers in biosecurity.

 

In this first year of the program, the Initiative will select up to 25 highly talented new professionals as Fellows from academia, government, defense, private industry, science, public health, medicine, and the social sciences. Fellows selected will be sponsored during the year to attend two biosecurity meetings, engage in networking opportunities with established leaders in the field, participate in a writing competition that can lead to publication and public presentation opportunities, and participate in educational webinars. Involvement in the Initiative will enable Fellows to develop leadership skills and connections that can propel them into a career in biosecurity.

 

Program description and application details available at:  (www.emergingbioleaders.org).

Applications must be submitted NLT March 15, 2012.

Editorial by Thomas V. Inglesby, Anita Cicero,
and D. A. Henderson

   
Thomas V. Inglesby, MD, is the Chief Executive Officer and Director; Anita Cicero, JD, is Chief Operating Officer and Deputy Director; and D. A. Henderson, MD, MPH, is a Distinguished Scholar, all at the Center for Biosecurity of UPMC, Baltimore, Maryland. Drs. Inglesby and Henderson are Coeditors-in-Chief of Biosecurity and Bioterrorism: Biodefense Strategy, Practice, and Science.

   
Over the past 8 years, H5N1 avian influenza has sickened 571 people, killing 59% of them. To give some perspective, the fatality rate of the virus that caused the 1918 Great Pandemic was 2%, and that pandemic killed on the order of 50 million people. Like all influenza strains, H5N1 is constantly evolving in nature. But thankfully, this deadly virus does not now spread readily through the air from person to person. If it evolves to become as transmissible as normal flu and results in a pandemic, it could cause billions of illnesses and deaths around the world—the proportion of the global population affected by past pandemics.

Scientists recently have announced that they genetically modified H5N1 in the laboratory and that this mutated strain spread through the air between ferrets that were physically separated from each other. This is ominous news. Since ferret influenza virus infection closely mirrors human infection and is similarly transmissible, these scientists appear to have created a bird flu strain with characteristics that indicate it would be readily transmissible by air between humans. In fact, the lead scientist on one of the experiments explicitly stated this.

The question is this: Should we purposefully engineer avian flu strains to become highly transmissible in humans? In our view, no. We believe the benefits of this work do not outweigh the risks. Here’s why. 

There are no guarantees that such a deadly strain of avian flu would not escape accidentally from the laboratory. This particular experiment was performed by internationally respected scientists in biosafety conditions considered top of the line. They seem to have taken the expected and necessary precautions. The risk of a person accidentally becoming infected and starting an outbreak with this new strain is low. But it is not zero.

The safety record of most labs working at high biocontainment levels is outstanding, and the historic number of accidents is very low. In almost all situations, even if a laboratory worker comes in contact with a dangerous pathogen and becomes sick, the risk of extensive wide community spread is negligible. This is because very few dangerous pathogens are as highly transmissible as influenza is. An accidental escape of an influenza strain from a lab in 1977 proves the possibility: That accident led to widespread flu epidemics. Given the potential global consequences of an accident with the newly modified strain of avian flu, we are playing with fire.

We are not opposed to research in high-containment labs using dangerous pathogens, including H5N1. Over the past decade, the Center for Biosecurity has publicly argued for the importance of such research to develop diagnostics, medicines, and vaccines for the most threatening infectious diseases. But research and development for those purposes does not require engineering lethal viruses to make them more transmissible between humans. There is no virus disease today other than influenza that has exhibited the potential attributes of global transmission such as has been documented with flu over the past 2 centuries and more. Thus, it occupies a unique position in the pantheon of microbes.

Some who defend the value of this recent experiment have argued that it is important to determine whether the present H5N1 strain could acquire genetic characteristics of a pandemic strain and, if so, what the particular characteristics might be. The thinking is that currently circulating strains of the H5N1 virus could then be screened for these characteristics, which, if found, might serve as an early warning. It is a speculative hope but not worth the potential risk.

Others have argued that the benefit of this experiment and its findings will be to motivate more work on H5N1 flu vaccines. Scientists have already developed bird flu vaccines, and research and development work continues. Should there be more money and effort devoted to improving our vaccine and medical defenses against H5N1 and other flu strains? Absolutely. But should we undertake experiments that engineer a transmissible strain of deadly flu in hopes that the frightening results invigorate R&D for vaccine development?

Still others have argued that this experiment may help directly in the vaccine development process. That argument is that now that we have this new transmissible strain, we should use it to test whether our current vaccines are effective against it. But it is unclear that vaccine protection against this engineered strain would correlate with vaccine protection against an H5N1 pandemic strain that evolves naturally in the world. Again, we would argue that the risk of accidental release outweighs the potential and uncertain benefits of engineering a pandemic strain.

An eminent scientific journal is considering whether to publish this work. A critical tenet of the advancement of science is the publication of new research in a form that allows other scientists to reproduce the work. This principle should be followed in almost all conceivable circumstances. But in this circumstance, it shouldn’t.

Publishing the methods for transforming the H5N1 virus into a highly transmissible strain would show other scientists around the world how to do it in their own labs. One concern is the possibility that the strain would be recreated for malevolent purposes. Even disregarding this risk (which we shouldn’t), scientific publication would encourage others that this is a research initiative worthy of additional exploration.

There are already checks in the research review process that include scientists’ consideration of these issues at project conception, deliberation at the time of funding decisions, institutional biosafety committee approvals, and the scientific publication review process. In principle, these elements should provide the necessary checks and balances. In this case, it will be important to understand the reasoning and decision making that led to the execution of this work. In the future, when an experimental plan calls for engineering a lethal virus into a highly transmissible one, then the rationale for funding and approval should be made explicit publicly.

Whether this experiment is published or not, it is a reminder of the power of biology and its potential. We need new approaches for the rapid development of large quantities of medicines or vaccines to protect us against new emerging viruses. But engineering highly transmissible strains of avian flu is not the way to get us there. 

http://www.upmc-biosecurity.org/website/resources/publications/2011/2011-12-15-editorial-engineering-H5N1

Testing the Anthrax Vaccine on Children:
Getting the Facts Right

I cannot comment on the wide range of opinions within the biodefense, public health, and medical communities regarding the testing of the anthrax vaccine on children, but I will comment on my recent conversations with senior FDA personnel regarding this subject.

My understanding is that FDA wants to ensure a program would be in place to collect data on children if there was a national emergency and parents were offered the opportunity for children to receive the vaccine. This is a far different issue than what Dr. Salzberg discussed.

Furthermore, Dr. Salzberg states, “…anthrax is not infectious.”  Unfortunately it is.  Anthrax is not contagious, it does not pass from human to human, but that fact does not mean that a vaccine is therefore not required.  Tetanus is not contagious, yet the vaccine is critically important to public health.  That is because the bacterium, Clostridium tetani.  Is ubiquitous in nature.  That is why CDC recommends a tetanus shot every ten years, or more often after a potential exposure.

Bacillus anthrasis (the causative agent of anthrax) exists in nature, which is why Ted Turner lost nearly 300 buffaloes on his Montana ranch in the summer of 2008. The good news is that currently we are not experiencing a public health emergency from anthrax exposure. That could, however, change quickly since anthrax remains the top bioterrorism threat.  An act of bioterrorism in major city would put millions at risk—a certain number from the initial release, and a far larger number from the potential of secondary aerosolization.

This secondary risk was demonstrated on the island of Gruinard off the coast of Scotland where the British tested anthrax weapons during World War II.  Anthrax is the one potential bioweapon that is persistent. It took the British four decades to adequately “clean” the environment on Gruinard. (Virtually all other pathogens would be rendered harmless by environmental conditions within hours/days.)

The recent WMD Center’s Bio-Response Report Card (www.wmdcenter.org) gave failing grades for America‘s capability to properly cleanup after an aerosol release of anthrax.  This means there would only be two courses of action following a large-scale outdoor release in an urban area:  evacuate for months, possibly years, or vaccinate the population.

I commend FDA for considering the implications and taking actions in preparation for what the bipartisan Congressional Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism stated was the top WMD threat—an anthrax attack.

Whether or not we do studies on children prior to a national emergency is highly controversial issue. However, if an attack occurred, I would want the vaccine to be an option for all parents, and I would expect FDA to have a plan for collecting information.

This is an important debate, and even more important that the debaters get the facts right.

By WIL S. HYLTON

Bio-Response Report Card

October 12, 2011
11:00 AM

Army-Navy Club
901 17th St NW
Washington DC

Light Lunch Provided

RSVP:  sara.rubin@wmdcenter.org

http://www.wmdcenter.org/

Fredericksburg VA
September 11, 2011 12:15 am

As we pause to reflect upon the unspeakable horrors we witnessed 10 years ago today–and the incredible courage of the first responders at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and of the passengers and crew of United Flight 93–I cannot help but think back to 1994, when I first began to study homeland security.

The Air Force had selected me for a one-year national security fellowship. I was to spend the year thinking and writing about national security in the 21st century. When I arrived at the Matthew B. Ridgway Center at the University of Pittsburgh, I had a vague notion for a topic–asymmetric warfare–but nothing specific.

I did know that one of the most important lessons current and future adversaries have learned from Desert Storm is that anyone who chooses to fight the United States head-on will lose. However, this doesn’t mean adversaries can’t challenge the U.S.; they just have to do so with unconventional methods. My research into these unconventional methods led me to examine how small nations and even some non-state actors could threaten our homeland using asymmetric warfare–in particular biological and nuclear terrorism.

By 1999, I was teaching a graduate course in homeland security at the National War College in Washington. This was a challenge: We didn’t know if any students would sign up for such a course, and there were no textbooks, virtually no journal articles, and little interest in the subject within the military, law-enforcement, intelligence, and public-health communities.

My first class of the fall semester in 2001 was scheduled for the afternoon of Sept. 11. I never made it to class that day.

For years afterward, people would ask if I was surprised by the attacks. My answer: No. I was shocked, but not surprised. I was shocked that people would deliberately kill large numbers of innocent civilians, but I was not surprised that there are people in the world who hate America and have the means to bring war to our homeland.

Several years later, Lee Hamilton and Tom Kean, co-chairmen of the 9/11 Commission, told us that our greatest mistake had been “a failure of imagination.” I was as guilty as all the rest. I had never imagined a scenario where people would hijack airplanes and turn them into powerful weapons.

I haven’t forgotten Hamilton and Kean’s warning, and I worry about it on this 10th anniversary of 9/11. America is once again falling victim to a failure of imagination. That failure is directly linked to another warning of the 9/11 commissioners: “What if the worst people in the world obtain the worst weapons in the world?”

Congress created a bipartisan commission to investigate the likelihood of such an event and to offer recommendations on how to prevent it. In 2009, I was director of the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism, chaired by former U.S. Sens. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) and Jim Talent (R-Mo.). The commission’s unanimous conclusion: It is possible to prevent nuclear terrorism if the nations of the world took “urgent and decisive actions.”

Preventing nuclear terrorism is not easy, but it is simple. All we have to do is “locate, lock down, and eliminate weapons-grade nuclear material.” Terrorists do not have the capability to enrich uranium or make plutonium; they can only buy it or steal it. If we successfully “lock it up,” there will be no mushroom cloud over an American city.

On the other hand, the biotechnical revolution has advanced at such a rapid pace that we cannot prevent acts of bioterrorism. That was the unanimous conclusion of the nine bipartisan WMD commissioners. Deadly pathogens, such as anthrax, plague, and tularemia, are readily available in nature. A small team of individuals with graduate-level training in several key disciplines, using equipment readily available for purchase on the Internet, could take naturally occurring pathogens and produce sophisticated bioweapons capable of killing hundreds of thousands of our citizens.

The clock is ticking. It is only a matter of time before America experiences a large-scale bio-event. It could be an act of bioterrorism, or it could be a natural pandemic. Will we be prepared to respond, or will we once again be guilty of a failure of imagination?

When the WMD Commission disbanded in February 2010, Sens. Graham and Talent and I created a research organization (WMD Center) to continue our work. Our goal is to help our leaders understand the threat of bioterrorism, and explain what can be done to prevent it from becoming a WMD.

On Oct. 13, the WMD Center will release its report card on America’s bio- response capabilities. Sens. Graham and Talent and I hope that this grade will be better than the “F” assigned by the WMD Commission in January 2010.

A nation that is properly prepared for response can remove bioterrorism from the category of “weapon of mass destruction.” Bioterrorism will always be a threat, but with diligence, we can mitigate its potential. Think “truck bomb,” rather than a catastrophic event that would change the course of history.

A new movie has been released: “Contagion.” Yes, it’s Hollywood, but the science depicted in the movie is very real. The story, albeit fictional, clearly demonstrates why America needs to improve its bio-response capabilities. Whether the pandemic comes from terrorists or Mother Nature,

America must improve its capabilities to rapidly diagnosis disease and quickly produce vaccines and therapeutics that are safe and effective. America must also increase the surge capacity of our medical-delivery system. Doing so will be neither cheap nor easy, but achieving these capabilities is what we call “no-regret investments.” Whether or not we experience an act of bioterrorism, these improvements will be of great benefit to our children and grandchildren.

The question that is foremost in my mind today: Will America learn the lesson of 9/11 before it’s too late?

_______________________

Colonel Randall Larsen, USAF (ret) is the CEO of the WMD Center (wmdcenter.org), a Senior Fellow at the Homeland Security Policy Institute at George Washington University, and the author of “Our Own Worst Enemy” (Grand Central, 2007).

Mr. Chairman and distinguished members, I am speaking today as the Vice Chairman of the Bipartisan WMD Terrorism Research Center, better known as the WMD Center. Even though former Senator Bob Graham (D-FL), the chairman of the WMD Center could not be here today, please consider this our joint statement.

The WMD Center is a not-for-profit research and educational organization that Senator Graham and I founded, along with Colonel Randy Larsen, USAF (ret), at the conclusion of the Congressional Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism (WMD Commission) in 2010.

WMD Commission

In early 2008, the Commission was tasked by Congress to assess the risk of WMD terrorism and to recommend steps to prevent a successful WMD attack on the United States. During its tenure, the WMD Commission interviewed hundreds of experts and reviewed thousands of pages of research and testimony. Each commissioner quickly realized that the United States was facing a growing threat of biological terrorism—a conclusion that was unexpected for many. We learned that the lethality of a sophisticated biological weapon could rival the lethality of a Hiroshima- sized bomb, and that the development and delivery of such a bioweapon would require far less money and technical expertise than a nuclear weapon.

In the commission report, World at Risk, we stated that terrorists are more likely to obtain and use a biological weapon than a nuclear weapon. In the late fall of 2008, we concluded that unless we act urgently and decisively, it was more likely than not that terrorists would use a weapon of mass destruction somewhere in the world by the end 2013. On December 2, 2008, the Director of National Intelligence publicly agreed with this assessment in a speech at Harvard University.

In an unprecedented act, Congress extended the authorization of the WMD Commission and assigned it a new task: to communicate its assessment, explain the evidence behind it, and to work with Congress and the Administration to enact the Commission’s recommendations. In other words, we were charged with encouraging Congress and the Administration to take decisive action to prevent such an act of mass lethality from taking place on American soil, and should such an attack occur, to limit its consequences.

In 2009, we worked closely with Congress and the Administration to focus on the threat of bioterrorism. As our second year of work drew to a close, we released a report card that assessed progress on a wide range of WMD issues; however, the grade that garnered the most attention in the January 2010 report was the failing grade for America’s preparedness to respond to a biological attack.

The WMD Center and its Bio-response Report Card

We founded the WMD Center to serve as an honest broker between government and the American public to ensure individual, community, and national progress in strengthening the nation’s capabilities to respond to biological threats. Our first major research project, scheduled for completion in mid-October, is a report card focused solely on America’s capability to respond to a large-scale biological event, whether man-made or naturally-occurring.

Lynne Kidder, the President of the WMD Center, is leading a highly qualified team of experts in this study. During Phase I, our project’s advisors were charged with designing the metrics for evaluating bio-response capabilities. Advisors include a former Deputy Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, the former Chief Counsel at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the former Special Assistant to the President for Biodefense (in the Clinton and Bush Administrations), the Founding President of the Albert B. Sabin Vaccine Institute, the Director of Disaster Medicine at the American Medical Association, and the Director of RAND Health. (A complete list of advisors is available at www.wmdcenter.org).

In Phase II of our study, a separate, independent team of subject matter experts will collect data and provide analysis in each of seven categories:

• Detection and situational awareness
• Diagnosis and attribution
• Communicating actionable information
• Medical countermeasures (development and production of vaccines and therapeutics)
•  Distributing/dispensing medical countermeasures
• Medical treatment and response
• Environmental remediation

In order to ensure rigorous review and diverse perspectives, this second team includes experienced practitioners and thought leaders from academia, leading think tanks, former government officials, and private sector organizations that specialize in biodefense. These experts will provide their analyses and insights to the WMD Center Board of Directors, who will ultimately determine final grades, recommendations, and report content.

Our report card will be released in mid-October. It will consist of three parts: a review of the threat, an assessment of America’s current capabilities to effectively respond to act of bioterrorism, and recommendations that will set us on the course to reach our goal: removing bioterrorism from the category of WMD. While we will never be able to remove nuclear weapons from the category of WMD, it is within our power to remove bioterrorism from the category.

Given the ubiquity of select agents readily found in nature and the rapid advances in bio- technology that allow non-state actors the capability to produce sophisticated bioweapons, a major part of our biodefense strategy must be based on building a level of preparedness that will effectively remove bioweapons from the category of WMD. An attack would still cause casualties, but it would not be of a magnitude that would change the course of history.

This is a realistic and achievable goal.

WMD Bill

The WMD Center is not in the business of assigning grades to specific pieces of legislation; however, if we were in that business, this carefully-crafted, comprehensive bill would receive high marks. If all articles within this legislation were to become law, it would represent progress for America’s biodefense capabilities.

We do understand the challenges of moving this legislation through the various committees and subcommittees that will claim oversight responsibility. It should be noted that the 9/11 Commission warned of the Byzantine jurisdictional assignment of congressional oversight of homeland security. In January 2010, the WMD Commission gave Congress a failing grade for the lack of response to its recommendation: “reform Congressional oversight to better address intelligence, homeland security, and crosscutting 21st century national security missions”.

The WMD Center fully supports many of the provisions of the bipartisan bill you’ve introduced today. In particular, we support your call for the re-establishment of the position previously called, Special Assistant to the President for Biodefense.

We are also pleased with other provisions that are consistent with WMD Commission recommendations, including requirements for:

• A national biodefense plan
• A national bio-surveillance strategy
• A comprehensive cross-cutting biodefense budget analysis
• A national intelligence strategy for countering biological threats
• Improvements in how the government communicates the threat of bioterrorism
• Improved detection capabilities
• First responder guidance on WMD
• Guidelines on environmental cleanup and restoration

The Road Ahead

While we enthusiastically support this legislation, we also must ask, is it enough? This legislation will help move the nation toward the WMD Center’s goal of removing bioterrorism from the category of WMD, but it will not get us all the way there. We will not reach this goal during the tenure of the 112th Congress, but rather, it will require a long-term commitment. We must ensure that the legislation and policies we enact today and each year forward lead us toward that goal.

It is difficult to envision improvement without appropriate leadership and organizational structure. The 2008 report of the Project on National Security Reform, Forging a New Shield, examined the “uneven performance of the federal government” during several post-cold war national security scenarios, from 9/11 to Katrina.

The report concludes:

“It is facile to blame all these regrettable outcomes on particular leaders and their policy choices. Leadership and judgment matter, to be sure, but as this Report demonstrates, no leader, no matter how strategically farsighted and talented as a manager, could have handled these issues without being hampered by the weaknesses of the current system.”

While the WMD Center fully supports your call to re-establish the position of Special Assistant to the President for Biodefense, we understand that doing so will not fix all the deficiencies in leadership and organizational structure for America’s biodefense enterprise. These will be among the most important issues we consider in the assessment and recommendations of our report card.

We are fortunate to have the experience and wisdom of two dozen of America’s top biodefense and public health experts assisting our project, but we are also considering the findings of recent reports by the National Biological Science Board, the National Academies, the Defense Science Board, and others.

Senator Graham and I look forward to providing you our assessments and recommendations in October. While I can’t provide specific details today, I can predict that some of the recommendations will require neither authorization nor appropriations, and yet will provide significant improvements in capabilities. Other recommendations will require congressional authorization, and we know that will be challenging given multiple committees with jurisdiction. Some recommendations will require more funding – a huge challenge in this fiscal environment. We will talk about partnerships between the public and private sectors, and while that has been a great bumper sticker for the post 9/11 era, it has proven far more challenging to implement.

Multiple-Benefits

The good news is that many of our recommendations will have multiple-benefits for our families and local communities, whether or not they experience a large-scale bioterrorist attack. Improvements in the rapid diagnosis of disease, the capability to quickly produce safe and effective vaccines and therapeutics, and increased surge capacity in our medical care systems will benefit us all – for we know with certainty that Mother Nature will present biological threats. These no-regret initiatives will be a great legacy for our children and grandchildren, and will also help keep America at the leading edge of the biotech revolution.

The Growing Threat of Bioterrorism

Removing bioterrorism from the category of WMD will neither be quick nor easy, but it is vital to both America’s economic and national security. I would remind you that bin Laden had a background in construction. It shouldn’t be surprising that he chose to attack buildings in America, because he understood what damage could be wrought by flying fully-fueled, wide body airplanes into those structures. Al Qaeda’s new leader is just as determined to attack America. His formal training was in medicine and infectious disease—one more reason we worry about bioterrorism. But this is not just about al Qaeda.

If the FBI is correct in its assertion that Dr. Bruce Ivins was the sole perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax letter attacks, then a single individual with no training or experience in weaponizing pathogens, and using equipment readily available for purchase on the internet, was capable of producing high-quality, dry-powdered anthrax. The only difference between producing enough material for several envelopes and enough material to attack a city is just a matter of a few months production work in a laboratory, rather than the few hours of late night work cited by the FBI investigation.

The bottom line on the feasibility of bioterrorism is quite clear. Today, terrorists have ready access to pathogens, the capability to weaponize them, and the means to effectively dispense a biological weapon. There is no question on intent.

Removing Bioterrorism from the Category of WMD

It is well within the capacity of our nation to address this threat. The issue here is less a question of resources or knowledge than it is one of leadership and purpose. Our nation must recognize that the danger of a bioattack against the American homeland is a high priority threat.

At the explicit request of the leaders of Congress, the WMD Commission recommended the steps necessary to defend the nation against that threat. The WMD Center report card will offer even more specific recommendations this fall.

The question is the same as when the WMD Commission issued its first report in December 2008: Will our leaders take bold actions commensurate with the seriousness of this threat?

Even as a very junior officer in Vietnam in the 1960s, it was obvious that the U.S. organizational structure was dysfunctional.  General Westmoreland thought he was in charge, the US Ambassador thought he was in charge, the CIA station chief thought he was in charge, and the commander of Pacific forces thought he was in charge.  This dysfunctional national security model lasted nearly another two decades—through the failed rescue attempt in Iran, the enormous coordination problems encountered during the invasion of Grenada, and the tragedy at the Marine barracks in Beirut.

On the other hand, the organization that planned and conducted the raid on bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan represents a quantum improvement.  For that, we can thank the U.S. Congress (something I don’t frequently do). The executive branch would never have stepped forward to make the necessary organizational changes—in fact, the Chief of Naval Operations called the idea “un-American” —but Congress, in one of its greatest demonstrations of courage and wisdom, gave America the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986.

The Congressional hearings on the Marine barracks disaster revealed that there had been 44 levels of command and staff between the President and the on-scene Marine commander. There were no clear lines of authority, responsibility, and accountability. To say Goldwater-Nichols streamlined the organizational model is a gross understatement. It reduced it from 44 to 4, and provided clear lines of authority, responsibility, and accountability.

Beginning with Just Cause in Panama, closely followed by Desert Shield and Desert Storm in the Arabian Peninsula and all the way through the capture and summary execution of bin Laden, we have testament to the power of proper organizations.

Unfortunately, America’s biodefense organizational structure is far closer to Vietnam than what we witnessed in the termination of bin Laden. Today there are more than two dozen Presidentially-appointed, Senate-confirmed individuals with some responsibility for biodefense, but no one has it for a full-time job and no one is in charge. This is so troubling because the planning, preparation, and execution of a response to an act of bioterrorism is far more complex than the bin Laden operation, and in some respects, even more complex and time-sensitive than Eisenhower’s European campaign.

We have plenty of examples of the results delivered by dysfunctional organizations and some notable models of success.  Will Congress once again demonstrate the courage and wisdom to provide the solution to a critical national security problem, or will it be up to a commission appointed by Congress to examine the disastrous response to an act of bioterrorism?

To downplay the threat of bioterrorism, Mr. Healy quotes Milton Leitenberg from the University of Maryland: “The idea that four guys in a cave are going to create bioweapons from scratch — that will be never, ever, ever.”

The statements of both Mr. Healy and Mr. Leitenberg require rebuttal.

Mr. Healy believes that: “Free trade leads to a wealthier world, and a wealthier world is a safer world.” He also quotes the new Human Security Report: “Greatly increased levels of international trade and foreign direct investment have raised the costs of conquest and shrunk its benefits.… In today’s open global trading system, it is almost always cheaper to acquire goods and raw materials by trade than to invade a country in order to steal them.”

While a strong supporter of free trade, this line of argument always takes me back to the Nobel Prize winning book, The Great Illusion by Norman Angell, first published in 1909 and one of the best selling books of its era.

The great military historian John Kegan best described Angell’s work: “Europe in the summer of 1914 enjoyed a peaceful productivity so dependent on international exchange and co-operation that a belief in the impossibility of a general war seemed the most conventional of wisdoms. In 1910 an analysis of prevailing economic interdependence, The Great Illusion, had become a best-seller; its author Norman Angell had demonstrated, to the satisfaction of almost all informed opinion, that the disruption of international credit inevitably to be caused by war would either deter its outbreak or bring it speedily to an end.”

Four years later, the world learned that this economic interdependence would neither deter war nor keep it short.  Following World War I, Angell revised his work and re-released it in 1933, arguing it is almost always cheaper to acquire goods and raw materials by trade than to invade a country.  (Do you understand why I had the déjà vu when I read the quote from the recently released Human Security Report?)

Bottom line: I am not ready to nominate the authors of the Human Security Report for the Nobel Peace Prize. The world remains a dangerous place, arguably far more dangerous than either 1914 or 1939.  People have not changed, but technology has, and that is where Mr. Leitenberg continues to mislead and misinform.

“The idea that four guys in a cave are going to create bioweapons from scratch — that will be never, ever, ever.” This is a favorite sound bite of Mr. Leitenberg and it is frequently quoted in the press. Like many of his statements, it is factually correct and totally irrelevant to the debate.

The more appropriate quote comes from Dr. Gerald Epstein at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, “I don’t worry about terrorists in caves becoming biologists, I worry about biologists becoming terrorists.”  Most competent analysts spend little time worrying about guys in long robes and unkempt beards sitting in a cave brewing up a dangerous bioweapon. And one doesn’t need to be a Nobel Prize Laureate microbiologist to become a bioterrorist — a small group of graduate students with a budget of less than six figures could likely succeed.

According to Mr. Leitenberg’s biographical information on the University of Maryland web site he has not worked as a “scientist” since 1966.  (Link)  Laboratories and technologies have changed dramatically since the time of his last laboratory experience four decades ago, when it did take superpower technology to produce a sophisticated biological weapon.

Mr. Leitenberg frequently claims it is difficult, if not impossible for a non-state actor to:

• Acquire a sample of a deadly pathogen
• Weaponize a pathogen
• Effectively deliver weaponized material

All three assertions are wrong.

A recent report by the Center for Biosecurity of UPMC clearly demonstrates the ubiquity of deadly pathogens. ( Link)  The short article and inter-active map clearly demonstrate where one could have found 30 of the pathogens on the U.S Select Agent List (including the causative agents for: anthrax, plague, tularemia, Ebola and Marburg) during a recent 22-month period, when these all caused cases of human and/or animal infections/deaths. Locating, locking down, and eliminating nuclear weapons material may be sound approaches to keeping these materials out of the hands of terrorists, but such an approach cannot possibly protect us from bioterrorists.  These deadly pathogens, the raw material for bioweapons, are readily available in nature.

Weaponization was the most challenging part of developing a bioweapons program when Mr. Leitenberg was working in a laboratory. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case. Everything one needs to know about weaponization (creating 3-5 micron-sized particles, adding stabilizers to reduce environmental degradation, and eliminating electrostatic charge) is common industrial practice, well-documented in the private sector. Just take a look at the tutorials offered at last October’s conference of the American Association of Aerosol Research  (Link).

Mr. Leitenberg’s assertion that effective delivery of a weaponized pathogen is a serious technical challenge is egregiously wrong. He should ask about a recent test of the biosensors at the Pentagon.  In this test, a simulant was used to test the sensors’ ability to detect a release of bioweapon-sized particles upwind of the Pentagon.  A $50 leaf blower was used as the delivery device — technology that is most likely available to terrorists.

Mr. Leitenberg is obviously a favorite of the CATO Institute.  Several years ago I was invited to debate Mr. Leitenberg at CATO. I was a bit surprised when I arrived and discovered that Mr. Leitenberg was going to have 20 minutes for his remarks, and I was given only five.  I almost left before the event, but then realized, it only takes about five minutes to refute his long outdated assertions.

It is delusional to believe we are not living in a dangerous world, arguably, far more dangerous than any other time in history.  It is also misguided to accept the ill-informed assertions of Mr. Leitenberg, a man who chooses to remain out of touch with the realities of modern biotechnology.