[CPEO-MEF] BIOWEAPONS: Boston lab safety study

[Lenny Siegel <lennysiegel@gmail.com>]

Scientists call for biolab safety study
National Research Council urges US

By Stephen Smith
Boston Globe (MA)
May 3, 2008

An elite panel of scientists urged the federal government yesterday to 
take a deeper look at the safety of a controversial research laboratory 
being built by Boston University.

The recommendation comes from the National Research Council, an 
independent advisory board, which sharply criticized the federal 
government in November for previous safety reviews of the BU project, 
branding them "not sound and credible."

If the federal government heeds the advice, the opening of the BU lab 
could be significantly delayed. Already, the university has abandoned 
long-stated plans to open the South End facility by this fall, and a BU 
spokeswoman said yesterday that it was premature to speculate about a 
revised opening date for the $200 million project.

One of the scientists who drafted the recommendations, Gigi Kwik 
Gronvall of the University of Pittsburgh, said that the panel did not 
consider how long it would take to conduct the expanded review. "I know 
this is a dissatisfying answer, but it was not part of our charge to do 
that," Gronvall said in an interview.

BU won a competition in 2003 to open one of two new Biosafety Level-4 
labs in the country, regarded as cornerstones in the Bush 
administration's campaign to prepare for possible acts of bioterrorism. 
The high-security lab, being built on the BU medical school campus, 
would allow scientists to work with the world's deadliest germs, 
including those that cause Ebola, plague, and Marburg.

...

For the entire article, see
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2008/05/03/scientists_call_for_biolab_safety_study/

--


Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org



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