By Joe Fiorill
Global Security Newswire
WASHINGTON — Biological Weapons Convention parties meeting this week in Geneva are expected to lend their imprimatur to a broad, scientist-generated set of principles to guide development of codes of conduct for sensitive biological research (see GSN, Dec. 6).
The codes, an idea that gained traction in the wake of the 2001 al-Qaeda attacks and anthrax mailings in the United States, are meant to strengthen barriers to biological weapons proliferation by raising scientists’ awareness of the security risks their work may entail. This year’s talks on codes have been shaped to an unusual degree by scientists themselves, rather than by diplomats or politicians, informed officials and observers said. Treaty parties invited scientists to Geneva earlier this year for an experts meeting to lay the groundwork for this week’s annual meeting of treaty nations. “It really did capture the imagination of other people that don’t typically involve themselves in this process,” said Gigi Kwik Gronvall, an associate at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Center for Biosecurity who was a participant at the June meeting. “From what I can see, science is often second, or irrelevant to the way that these types of meetings are conducted.” The parties meet next year in the sixth treaty-review conference since the pact entered into force in 1975. Since the last such conference — conducted over two sessions in 2001 and 2002 — the members have annually held experts meetings and treaty-party meetings on topics including disease surveillance, national laws and disease-outbreak response. This year’s talks on codes of conduct are the last in the special-topics series. “Each of [the topics] recognizes one has to operate in mechanisms that are nontraditional for the diplomatic community,” Center for Strategic and International Studies bioterrorism expert Gerald Epstein said yesterday. “The code-of-conduct one is the most so.” All the topics will be addressed at next year’s review conference. As a result of scientists’ heavy involvement in this year’s discussions, according to some familiar with the talks, the parties figure ultimately then to endorse principles that borrow heavily from those issued last month by the Interacademy Panel on International Issues, a coalition of science academies. “We think that the academies are on the right track, basically,” said a U.S. official familiar with the talks. “In the end, it’s the scientists that have to adopt this way of behaving and internalize it. It can’t be forced on a group of unwilling scientists.” Many biologists say government regulation can hamper their studies and can be difficult to enforce, especially when the research involves “dual-use” materials. Many experiments, they add, can yield unanticipated results with biosecurity implications. One result of these difficulties has been an intense interest in codes of conduct. “What we’re hoping for” this week, the U.S. official said in an interview yesterday, “is a relatively brief final document that would put down on paper some of the general principles that ought to be the basis for codes of conduct for life sciences, both in terms of what a code would say substantively [and] in terms of where a code would come from, how it would be arrived at.” World’s Academies, Treaty Members State Flexible PrinciplesTreaty parties appear poised to embrace a flexible approach to the problem, in which they would promulgate principles but issue no mandates to scientific academies, which in turn would refrain from mandating specific codes to individual science institutions. Last month’s Interacademy Panel statement, by its own description, “presents principles to guide individual scientists and local scientific communities that may wish to define a code of conduct for their own use.” “In recent decades,” the academies said in the statement, “scientific research has created new and unexpected opportunities to improve human and animal health and environmental conditions. But some science and technology can be used for destructive purposes, as well as for constructive purposes.” “Scientists have a special responsibility,” the panel said, “when it comes to problems of ‘dual use’ and the misuse of science and technology.” The panel said scientists should “bear in mind the potential consequences — possibly harmful — of their research and recognize that individual good conscience does not justify ignoring the possible misuse of their scientific endeavor.” The umbrella group said scientists should not only “refuse to undertake research that has only harmful consequences for humankind” but also promote safe, secure laboratory practices and raise awareness of laws and norms on biological research. Researchers should report to authorities activities that could violate international law, added the panel. Sixty-eight academies signed the statement. They included the national science academies of the United States, the United Kingdom, France, China, Japan, South Korea, Russia, India and Pakistan, as well as international groups such as the African Academy of Sciences and the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World. A “chairman’s synthesis” prepared for this week’s treaty meeting includes many of the principles laid out by the academies. The document limits itself to listing code-of-conduct principles that have been “suggested” this year, including that scientists should refuse to engage in biological weapons work, should be aware of the potential for inadvertently advancing such work and should “take active steps to prevent or stop” that activity. The synthesis also notes the possibility of a requirement that abuses be reported to authorities, procedures for submitting reports and sanctions to be imposed on violators. Like the Interacademy Panel statement, the synthesis emphasizes flexibility and self-determination, citing in particular the possibility of a three-layer system in which treaty parties lay out universal norms, scientific bodies promulgate corresponding and more detailed code principles, and specific institutions enact codes based on the principles. “It was suggested,” the synthesis indicates in its standard neutral formulation, that “there should be no attempt to impose a particular form or format of code.” Experts Cite Shortcomings, Benefits of Code ProcessExpert observers acknowledged the shortcomings of the code-of-conduct approach to addressing the security risks of research while lauding the process and its potential for raising scientists’ awareness of concerns about which they may be uninformed. “The greatest value would be that scientists know that there is such a thing as the BWC,” Gronvall said in a recent interview. Gronvall stressed also the importance of scientists’ being the source of the code principles, particularly because they know what limits can and cannot be realistically imposed on research. “What I tried to say” at the June meeting, she said, “was that you have to be aware of the body you’re trying to regulate … that [as a scientist] you cannot always predict what you’re going to find. Otherwise, you wouldn’t bother to do the experiments.” Epstein said codes of conduct can make researchers aware that “there may be people whose objectives are very different from what theirs are” — a crucial role, the CSIS Homeland Security Program senior fellow said, given that “these are not the sorts of things governments can impose from the top down and make binding.” Rutgers University chemistry professor Richard Ebright, however, said yesterday that codes have their place but that regulation is needed. “It is essential, at least at the national level, that there be regulations with force of law that are universal in scope, applied to all institutions and require compliance,” said Ebright, a protein biochemistry researcher at the university’s Waksman Institute of Microbiology. In the United States, he said, action should be taken to make National Institutes of Health research guidelines mandatory and to expand and bolster the “select agent” rule, which governs use and transfer of certain pathogens. “Obviously, many scientists would prefer not to have any regulations, just as many accountants would prefer not to have any regulations,” Ebright said. Failing to regulate research because of the difficulties of doing so, he said, is “nonsense.” In a March 2005 article in Science, McGill University’s Margaret Somerville and the University of Louisville’s Ronald Atlas argued the case for codes of conduct. The two researchers acknowledged that “past breaches of ethics have occurred despite the existence of a code,” but said codes can have a significant, if limited, effect. “Past experience tells us,” they wrote, “that violations of a code can result in a loss of respect by peers, loss of public trust and thereby public support, loss of research funding and censures for breaches of ethics and legal penalties, including loss of professional licenses to practice.” Epstein said that since any one measure to reduce proliferation risks is limited, “You want to come at the problem in as many places as you can.” He said codes of conduct should be one part in a multifaceted program — also including interdiction, surveillance and other efforts — but would have little use on their own. “Very few terrorists,” Epstein said, “are going to be one step away from releasing the valve and all of a sudden slap their heads and say, ‘Oh my God, I forgot there’s that code of conduct!’”
Hospitals in Pennsylvania have received a database with more than 10,000 photographs showing skin symptoms of 600 diseases to aid first responders and doctors in identifying a bioterrorist attack, the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, Nov. 3). Forty-five hospitals received the tool, which is already used in New York and Washington, along with a $700,000 federal preparedness grant, according to state Health Department spokesman Troy Thompson. If successful, the system would be installed in nearly 200 Pennsylvania hospitals, he said. “We know the importance of being able to quickly and accurately identify health threats,” Thompson said. “This is a big step forward for our bioterrorism preparedness.” While medical reference books include few pictures, the database is capable of showing a dozen or more images of a disease in various stages. A doctor can start generally, looking at pictures of rashes or lesions, then focus the search based upon prior medical history, recent travel and other symptoms, according to AP. The system is accessed online and complemented with CD-ROMs containing data in case Internet service is lost during an emergency, AP reported. The database would be of great assistance in a bioterrorist attack, said Art Papier, founder of system producer Logical Images. “Even the most astute clinician will have difficulty diagnosing a disease they have never seen before. One of the lessons of the unfortunate anthrax events of 2001 was the need to better prepare doctors for identifying very rare disorders,” Papier said (Joann Loviglio, Associated Press/Newsday, Dec. 7).
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