
Biosecurity Innovation and Risk Reduction Initiative
Advances in biotechnology outpace national governments’ ability to provide needed oversight to prevent accidents or deliberate misuse of dangerous biological agents.
Biological threats – whether natural, accidental or deliberate — can kill millions, cost billions, and create political and economic instability in individual countries and around the world. The risks and consequences of a global catastrophic biological event can be magnified by weak global health security, increasing urbanization and travel, growing terrorist interest in weapons of mass destruction, and rapid advances in technology that enable newly developed or manipulated pathogens with pandemic potential.
To reduce these risks and strengthen biosecurity, NTI | bio works with governments, industry, academia, international organizations and NGOs to foster multilateral dialogue, identify weaknesses, and promote systemic change to improve biotechnology governance and national health security capacities.
NTI offers solutions through a range of projects. Among them:
Advances in biotechnology outpace national governments’ ability to provide needed oversight to prevent accidents or deliberate misuse of dangerous biological agents.
Reducing biological risk and enhancing global security
Preventing global catastrophic biological risks (GCBRS)
The GHS Index highlights individual country needs, boost compliance with international standards, and create better understanding of global capabilities to prevent, detect, and respond to biological threats.
Safeguarding modern bioscience and biotechnology so it can advance and flourish safely and responsibly
Rapidly assessing origins of high-consequence global biological events
Cultivating the Next Generation of Global Biosecurity Leaders
Establishing an international Common Mechanism for DNA Synthesis Screening
Establishing stronger norms and practices to prevent accidents, misuse, and other adverse outcomes of life science research
A new digital report and companion summary detail the findings and recommendations developed from a tabletop exercise held by NTI | bio and the Munich Security Conference.
A new NTI | bio report describes the status of benchtop DNA synthesis devices, explains the risks for biosecurity, and recommends action and oversight by governments, industry, and the scientific community.
A new NTI | bio report describes the status of benchtop DNA synthesis devices, explains the risks for biosecurity, and recommends action and oversight by governments, industry, and the scientific community.
The authors write about effective strategies for preventing biological events that could rise to the level of a global catastrophe by disincentivizing states from bioweapons development and use.
A new analysis published by the Consejo Argentino para las Relaciones Internacionales (CARI) highlights why the Latin America and Caribbean region would benefit from the establishment of a Joint Assessment Mechanism to discern source of high-consequence biological events of unknown origin.