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U.S. Scientist Highlights Dangers of Enhanced Smallpox, Monkeypox By David McGlinchey GENEVA — With a basic level of biological training, terrorists could modify smallpox or monkeypox viruses and create a previously unseen strain of biological weapon, a U.S. virologist said last week (see GSN, Oct. 23). Monkeypox, in particular, is easier to obtain and produce than smallpox, according to Mark Buller, a St. Louis University professor who is currently studying how terrorists could use genetic engineering to enhance pox viruses. Buller spoke during the Smallpox Biosecurity conference, which was sponsored by vaccine producer Acambis. Buller noted, however, that monkeypox historically has a significantly lower mortality rate than smallpox. Monkeypox kills about 10 percent of its victims and smallpox kills about 30 percent. A strain of monkeypox was brought into the United States by a pet giant Gambian rat earlier this year, but there were no fatalities among the 49 reported cases (see GSN, June 12). Smallpox itself could be genetically enhanced and its lethality rate greatly increased but the virus might become less transmissible in the process, Buller said. Terrorists could also make the smallpox virus difficult to detect by changing the disease’s clinical features or make it spread faster by increasing the frequency of coughing in victims, he added. The presentation sparked a small debate among conference delegates over whether the report and research should have been classified. An official from the National Institutes of Health — which sponsored Buller’s work — said that the information is already available in other forums.
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