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U.K. Has Hundreds of Disease Research Labs
There are hundreds of laboratories in the There are five facilities authorized to handle Category 4 pathogens that cause “severe disease in humans” and have “no effective prophylaxis, or treatment” available.” Among the 16 such diseases are Lassa fever and Ebola. The British Health and Safety Executive refuses to identify the sites on security grounds, but the newspaper named the Health Protection Agency Center for Infections in north London, the Center for Emergency Preparedness and Response at Porton Down, the Defense Science and Technology Laboratory at Porton Down, and the National Institute for Biological Standards and Control in Hertfordshire. Research is conducted at roughly 450 facilities — most operated by universities and pharmaceutical firms — on Category 3 pathogens that are dangerous to humans but treatable. Such pathogens include salmonella, yellow fever, SARS and hepatitis. There were a few cases of researchers being infected with diseases in the 1970s, but otherwise the laboratories largely have strong safety records, according to the Times. There have been more recent questions about biosecurity at laboratories that handle pathogens that could kill animals. Two sites have received six “notices” in four years from the Health and Safety Executive. One of those facilities, the Institute for Animal Health laboratory at Pirbright, might be linked to an outbreak this month of foot-and-mouth disease in nearby livestock. Perfect biological security is not possible, experts said. “One can put in all the engineering and control methods in the world, but at the end of the day you still have to let the human beings in and out,” said Anton de Paiva, biological safety officer at
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