Call to stop deadly viruses getting into wrong hands

[Guest guest]

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/28/1072546410497.html

 

Call to stop deadly viruses getting into wrong hands

By Deborah Smith, Science Writer

December 29, 2003

 

 

 

Australian scientists have called for an international system to oversee

biological research that could be used by terrorists, warning that it is

increasingly easy to create deadly viruses against which there is no protection.

 

Ian Ramshaw, of the Australian National University, said policies that were

consistent between countries were needed. " It is a serious issue and as time

goes on it will become more of an issue, " Professor Ramshaw said.

 

He was critical of US researchers who have genetically modified cowpox virus,

which can infect humans, in a way that is likely to make it extremely deadly.

 

The team at the University of St Louis has said the research is necessary to

understand what terrorists might achieve. " But I cannot see any scientific

justification for it, " Professor Ramshaw said.

 

Sufficient knowledge could be obtained by restricting studies to mousepox virus,

which is similar to cowpox but cannot infect humans, he said.

 

Several years ago, Professor Ramshaw was a member of a team that accidentally

found a way of making mousepox more deadly while working on a contraceptive

vaccine for pest control. The Australian researchers found that adding a

particular mouse gene to the virus did not boost the immunity of infected mice,

as expected, but instead switched off a key part of their immune system, making

the virus lethal to 60 per cent of vaccinated animals. = 4) { b = 1; }

else if (name == 'Microsoft Internet Explorer' & ver >= 4) { b = 2; } else

{ b = 0; } if (b == 1) { var toolkit = java.awt.Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit();

var size = toolkit.getScreenSize(); width = self.innerWidth; if (width >= 772)

greater = 1; } else if (b == 2) { if (document.body.clientWidth >= 772)

greater = 1; } if (greater == 1) { document.write( "

@media print {.nopr {display:none}} advertisement

" );document.write( " " );document.write( " advertisement

" ); } } // -->

@media print {.nopr {display:none}}

 

 

 

It is a refinement of this approach which makes mousepox 100 per cent lethal

that the St Louis team used with cowpox. The Australian mousepox research was

published in early 2001 after a two-year delay, when the team and the Journal of

Virology, where it appeared, finally concluded its value in helping scientists

design better vaccines outweighed the risk of its use by terrorists to make

lethal human viruses.

 

The Australian research prompted an inquiry by the US National Academy of

Sciences. In October, the academy recommended the US Government set up a

national independent advisory committee. One of its roles would be to help local

safety committees - which operate at research institutions to ensure experiments

involving GM organisms are safe - take on the job of previewing, and possibly

banning, research projects that might be misused by terrorists.

 

The US academy, however, pointed out that a unilateral approach could

disadvantage US science and also called for a coordinated international system

to regulate this kind of research.

 

Adrian Gibbs, an expert in GM viruses at the Australian National University,

said he also agreed that an international approach was needed.

 

Professor Gibbs said it was reassuring that deadly new viruses created in the

laboratory often turned out to be disabled, and not very infectious. The kind of

evolutionary pressures that would cause them to become easily transmittable as

well were usually only found in a natural environment. " That is why we have to

be very careful about what we release into the wild. "

 

Dr Stephen Prowse, chief executive officer of the Australian Biosecurity

Co-operative Research Centre, said he believed the system of safety committees

in Australian research institutions was sufficient to deal with the issue here.

 

Last year, a team at the State University of New York created a deadly polio

virus and published their recipe in Science.

 

 

 

 

 

Find out what made the Top Searches of 2003