[NYTr] Anthrax and Tularemia Bioweapons Bungling in Texas

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

The Sunshine Project
News Release - 17 September 2007
http://www.sunshine-project.org

Anthrax and Tularemia Bioweapons Bungling in Texas

Time to Lay to Rest the Myth of "No Accidents"

On April 13th of this year, workers at a Houston, 
Texas biodefense lab were exposed to aerosolized 
anthrax. Just down the road in San Antonio and 
only a day before (April 12th), workers entered a 
tularemia lab to inspect malfunctioning air 
filters without wearing gloves or any respiratory 
protection. The incidents come on the heels of 
major safety and security violations at Texas A&M 
University, a US Department of Homeland Security 
biodefense Center of Excellence.

Are the recent lab accidents in Texas a streak of 
terribly bad luck, or is something else going on?

The University of Texas Health Science Center at 
Houston and University of Texas at San Antonio 
revealed the anthrax and tularemia incidents last 
week in response to Texas Public Information Act 
requests. Documents about the incidents are now 
online (links below). Both were reported to the 
Centers for Disease Control. No infections 
resulted, although some workers received 
antibiotic treatment.

In addition to the bioweapons agent accidents in 
Houston and San Antonio, on Friday (14 
September), the University of Texas at Austin 
revealed a series of mishaps, including at least 
four lab-acquired infections, in 2002, 2003, 
2004, and 2005, that were not properly 
documented, investigated, or reported. The 
infections involved shigella, an infectious 
bacteria which, in some cases, may have been 
genetically engineered.

The Austin infections were first revealed to the 
Austin American Statesman newspaper just hours 
before the University was obliged to provide the 
same information to the Sunshine Project under 
the Texas Public Information Act. The Austin 
American Statesman did not ask the University of 
Texas for information about lab accidents, 
rather, the University sought out the newspaper, 
preemptively discussing them with a reporter, in 
an apparent attempt to influence and damper 
coverage. The shigella infections follow a 
serious 2006 accident at UT Austin involving a 
genetically engineered influenza that crossed 
Bird Flu (H5N1) with a common flu type (H3N2). 
The University of Texas at Austin has produced 
conflicting accounts of that incident.

Since 2001, across the country, communities have 
faced debates over the construction of new 
biodefense labs. Typically, proponents of labs to 
study bioweapons agents have met safety and 
security questions with false and exaggerated 
claims. They have asserted that the facilities 
that experiment with bioweapons agents pose 
little or no risk and sometimes have discounted 
even the possibility of accidents. Knowingly 
advancing a logical fallacy, biodefense labs have 
deceitfully conflated the lack of public reports 
of accidents with a lack of problems.

But now, in Texas, accidents are popping up 
everywhere. "Reality is that lab workers and 
university professors screw up like the rest of 
us," says Sunshine Project Director Edward 
Hammond. "The lack of public accident reports 
never indicated an absence of accidents, rather, 
it has reflected a pervasive cover-up culture, a 
problem that has been dangerously exacerbated by 
the mushrooming biodefense program." Hammond 
continues, "What we are witnessing in Texas is 
not bad luck, it is the crumbling of the 
biodefense lobby's safety fagade."

The Sunshine Project is in the midst of a series 
of Public Information Act requests to all 
University of Texas components that conduct 
biomedical research.* The institutions have been 
asked for all records on suspected or actual 
accidents involving significantly pathogenic 
agents (risk group 2 or higher) since the end of 
1999.

Many accidents are recent. "It seems telling that 
none of the University of Texas institutions 
responding to our queries have produced a single 
record of a select agent lab mishap, not even a 
small one, that occurred before April 2007," says 
Hammond, "That was the month that Texas A&M's 
problems began to publicly surface. We surmise 
that until the Texas A&M scandal, some University 
of Texas institutions had a de facto policy of 
not recording accidents with bioweapons agents, 
probably for fear of the potentially embarrassing 
and costly consequences."

Other University of Texas institutions that 
operate BSL-3 labs, including the University of 
Texas at El Paso and the Health Center in Tyler, 
claim that they do not have a single record of a 
single incident - not a minor one, not even a 
suspected one that turned out to be a false alarm 
- since at least 1999.

"These institutions," says Hammond, "either have 
achieved the perfection of deities, or they don't 
have effective lab safety and security programs." 
The Sunshine Project concludes that the latter is 
the case, because effective programs would have 
generated incident reports and other paperwork. 
Says Hammond, "Some documented incidents are to 
be expected. The fact that these institutions 
have no records of any incidents, even small 
ones, raises serious questions. Is anyone minding 
safety and security in El Paso and elsewhere?"

The Sunshine Project has called for stepped up 
federal oversight of US biodefense labs, 
including legal reforms, mandatory accident 
reporting, and increased transparency, for 
several years.


Anthrax Incident:
University of Texas Health Science Center Houston
Incident/Accident Report, May 2007
Liquid from anthrax vials leaks inside unshielded 
tabletop centrifuge in BSL-3 lab.

Tularemia Incident:
University of Texas San Antonio
Incident Report, April 2007
Workers sent in to fix malfunctioning air filters 
enter BSL-3 tularemia lab without wearing gloves 
or respiratory protection.

Documents be downloaded here:
http://www.sunshine-project.org/publications/pr/pr180907.html

-----

Anthrax Incident:
University of Texas Health Science Center Houston
Incident/Accident Report, May 2007
Liquid from anthrax vials leaks inside unshielded 
tabletop centrifuge in BSL-3 lab.

Tularemia Incident:
University of Texas San Antonio
Incident Report, April 2007
Workers sent in to fix malfunctioning air filters 
enter BSL-3 tularemia lab without wearing gloves 
or respiratory protection.

Documents be downloaded here:
http://www.sunshine-project.org/publications/pr/pr180907.html

* Excluding the University of Texas Medical 
Branch at Galveston, due to ongoing settlement 
negotiations in relation to Sunshine Project 
Public Information Act requests.