The Bush administration relied on a flawed study to conclude that research on a highly infectious animal disease could safely be moved from an isolated island laboratory to sites on the mainland near livestock, congressional investigators concluded in findings obtained by The Associated Press.
The Homeland Security Department "does not have evidence" that foot-and-mouth disease research can be conducted on the U.S. mainland without significant risk of an animal epidemic, Congress' Government Accountability Office said.
Officials from the GAO and the Homeland Security Department were expected to square off Thursday at a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing. The administration isn't backing down on its view that modern laboratories have the highest security to prevent an escape of the virus.
The one certainty in the debate that has divided the commercial livestock industry: making the wrong choice could bring on an economic catastrophe.
While the disease does not sicken humans, an outbreak on the U.S. mainland — avoided since 1929 — could lead to slaughter of millions of animals, a halt in U.S. livestock movements, a ban on exports and severe losses in the production of meat and milk.
Emphasis added by me.
Jay Cohen, an undersecretary of Homeland Security, said in his prepared testimony: "While there is always a risk of human error ... the redundancies built into modern research laboratory designs and the latest biosecurity and containment systems ... effectively minimizes these risks."
Emphasis added by me.
Who is this guy? Here is his bio at the DHS website. Here's the fast summary:
Department of Homeland Security, Under Secretary for Science and Technology, Jay M. Cohen is a native of New York. He was commissioned in 1968 as an ensign upon graduation from the United States Naval Academy. He holds a joint Ocean Engineering degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Master of Science in Marine Engineering and Naval Architecture from MIT.
Do you see anything there pertaining to infectious diseases or epidemiology, for either human or animal vectors?
I damn well don't! Nor is there any reference in the rest of his bio to anything that involves infectious diseases or epidemiology for either human or animal vectors!
So how does this guy become the key man on this issue? Is he simply a puppet? Who are the puppeteers?
On the other side:
"We found that DHS has not conducted or commissioned any study to determine whether FMD (foot-and-mouth disease) work can be done safely on the U.S. mainland," according to testimony prepared for the committee by Nancy Kingsbury, the GAO's managing director for applied research and methods.
I don't know who she is, either. This is the GAO page that lists her. There is no bio.
Now between the two, right off I'm predisposed to the GAO's position. Why not do the most cautious thing here?
Read about the foot and mouth disease outbreak that occurred in England just last year. The suspected point of origin? A nearby animal disease research laboratory!
Our farmers here are right to be skittish. Look at what happened in England during a 2001 outbreak.
Foot and Mouth Disease Scares England:
An outbreak of foot and mouth disease in the United Kingdom in the spring and summer of 2001 was caused by a different strain of the disease. That episode saw more than 2,000 cases of the disease in farms across the British countryside. Around seven million sheep and cattle were killed in a successful attempt to halt the disease outbreak.
How much more serious would it be here?
More from the news report:
The AP reported in April that a 1978 release of the virus into cattle holding pens on Plum Island triggered new safety procedures. While that incident was previously known, Homeland Security officials acknowledged there were other accidents at Plum Island.
The GAO report listed six other accidents between 1971 and 2004.
"These incidents involved human error, lack of proper maintenance, equipment failure and deviation from standard operating procedures," the GAO said. "Many were not a function of the age of the facility or the lack of technology and could happen in any facility today."
The investigators found that the United States only avoided international restrictions after the 1978 outbreak because it was confined to the island.
Let's keep it on the damned island!
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