Lab-resurrected Spanish Flu virus an accident waiting to happen?
By Judi
McLeod & David Hawkins
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Is there a clear and present danger in a batch of resurrected virus, labeled a “select agent” in the laboratory at 1600 Clifton Road in Atlanta, Georgia?
That’s the address of the U.S. Government’s Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, where scientists have resurrected a replica of the 1918 Spanish flu virus, 90 years after it left an estimated 50 million people dead in all corners of the globe.
Researchers reason their work from the resurrection will significantly improve protection against natural flu viruses. Critics caution there is a real danger the real virus will escape, with potentially deadly consequences.
How do you prevent a virus from escaping a high-security lab when you can’t prevent the increasing “mysterious deaths” of some of the world’s top microbiologists?
The deaths of some 88 scientists and microbiologists, updated on June 16, 2005 are listed on the Internet. At least two of the dead scientists were leading experts in the field of influenza. Known as “Dr. Flu” for his expertise in treating influenza, and a noted expert in bioterrorism at the Colorado Health Sciences Centre, Steven Mostow, 63, died when the airplane he was piloting crashed near Denver, on March 25, 2002.
The body of Dr. Don C. Wiley, 57, one of the foremost microbiologists in the United States, was found Dec. 20, 2001 in the Mississippi River, while police found his rental car on a bridge outside Memphis, Tenn. Dr. Wiley, who worked at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Harvard University, was an expert on how the immune system responds to viral attacks such as HIV, ebola and influenza.
This is what Mark J. Harper, (mjharper712@hotmail.com) who compiled a list has to say about the deaths of the 88 dead scientists and microbiologists: “While some of these deaths may be purely coincidental and seem to pose no connection, many of these deaths are highly suspicious and appear not to be random acts of violence. Many are just plain murders.”
Many live scientists--alarmed at the recreation of the Spanish Flu virus-- are worried that its full genetic sequence was to be made public on an online genetic database.
How’s that new affecting a good night’s sleep?
It’s impossible to shackle viruses, which have escaped from high-security labs before. Indeed, the recent SARS virus escaped not once but twice, once in Taiwan and once in Singapore when researchers became contaminated.
“When SARS began its not so long ago lethal trek from the Orient to the West, it was reportedly “accidentally” released after a scientist visited a hotel near an airport in Beijing. Tragedy was soon to follow, and within days SARS was infecting, and in some cases killing, nurses and doctors in Toronto, Canada.
“In the SARS aftermath, there never was an explanation of why the scientist went to that particular hotel close to the airport. Rumours abounded in Beijing at the time that the scientist was not Chinese but North Korean. (Canada Free Press, March 14, 2005).
Lab work has now proven that Spanish Flu came straight from birds. “It looks as though an avian strain evolved in 1918 and that led to the deadly outbreak, in much the same way as we’re now seeing the Asian avian flu strains evolve,” said Professor Ronald Atlas, co-director of the centre for the deterrence of biowarfare and bioterrorism at the University of Louisville in Kentucky, (The Guardian).
Meanwhile, how confident does it make you to know that workers at a level 3 enhanced laboratory where “select agent” Spanish Flu virus sits, must wear protective clothing, breathing apparatus and gain entry via fingerprint and retina scans?
Canada Free Press founding editor Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience in the media. A former Toronto Sun and Kingston Whig Standard columnist, she has also appeared on Newsmax.com, the Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, and World Net Daily. Judi can be reached at: letters@canadafreepress.com. You can read your Letters to the Editor here.
