Controversial American scientist slammed for irresponsible flu research
Senior scientists have criticised an American university for allowing controversial research on enhancing a pandemic strain of flu virus to be undertaken in a laboratory with a relatively low level of biosecurity.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison was labelled irresponsible and negligent for allowing one of its scientists, Professor Yoshihiro Kawaoka, to genetically manipulate pandemic H1N1 flu virus in a laboratory categorised as biosafety level-2 (BSL-2).
Other experts believe that the research, which involved the creation of a strain of pandemic flu that has “escaped” from the control of the human immune system, should have been done at least at BSL-3 or even BSL-4, the most secure level of biosafety reserved for the most dangerous pathogens.
When pandemic H1N1 emerged in 2009 it killed between 151,000 and 540,000 people in the first year of the outbreak. Since then, most people have acquired a level of antibody immunity to the virus, which is now classified as “seasonal flu”.
The Independent revealed yesterday that Professor Kawaoka has for the past four years been working on ways of mutating the 2009 pandemic strain of H1N1 flu so that it is no longer neutralised by the antibodies that provide immunity for the wider population.
(continued, instant population control? weaponised flu....should do it?)
