Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

[sharon sanders]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

hat tip Michael Coston

Bird Flu Research Reconsidered
Biosecurity agency will give controversial H5N1 bird flu research another look-over in light of new data and clarification.
By Hannah Waters | March 1, 2012


snip


At the meeting, Fauci said that new versions of the manuscripts—including new data and “reevaluations of old data”—call for reexamination of the research in full, especially as the NSABB has had more limited access to the data than the WHO panel that recommended full publication 2 weeks ago.

Members of the NSABB declined to speculate on how the panel will view the publications, but they’re keeping open minds, reported ScienceNOW. “The recommendations from NSABB can clearly be changed in the future,” acting chair Paul Keim of Northern Arizona University said at the meeting. “We can go back and reverse this if that is the best course of action.”

http://the-scientist.com/2012/03/01/bird-flu-research-reconsidered/

---------------------------

So they are re-writing the paper?

[Shiloh]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/06/he...flu-virus.html

Amateurs Are New Fear in Creating Mutant Virus

By CARL ZIMMER
Published: March 5, 2012

Just how easy is it to make a deadly virus?...

...Over the past decade, more amateur biologists have started to do genetic experiments of their own. One hub of this so-called D.I.Y. biology movement, the Web site Ybio.orgDI, now has more than 2,000 members.

?I worry about the garage scientist, about the do-your-own scientist, about the person who just wants to try and see if they can do it,? Michael T. Osterholm of the University of Minnesota said last week at a meeting of biosecurity experts in Washington.

Dr. Arturo Casadevall of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City, who along with Dr. Osterholm is a member of the scientific advisory board that initially recommended against publishing the papers, agreed. ?Mike is right,? he said in a telephone interview. ?Humans are very inventive.?

Advocates of D.I.Y. biology say such fears not only are wildly exaggerated, but could interfere with their efforts to educate the public...

[gsgs]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

they don't have a forum

[Shiloh]

Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

Source: http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/cidrap/con...212export.html

Dutch export rules could block publication of Fouchier H5N1 study
Robert Roos * News Editor

Mar 12, 2012 (CIDRAP News) ? In a new twist in the ongoing controversy over publication of two studies involving H5N1 viruses with increased transmissibility, there are indications that the Dutch government may consider using export regulations to prevent full publication of the study by Ron Fouchier, PhD, and colleagues.

In a Mar 7 letter to the Dutch parliament, the country's minister of public health, welfare, and sport, Dr. E. I. Schippers, said an export permit is required for dissemination of detailed information about the H5N1 virus outside the European Union. If such a permit is requested, the government will consider the health and safety risks of granting it, the minister said.

In addition, a Mar 9 report in a Dutch newspaper, the Amsterdam-based Volkskrant, said that Henk Bleker, the nation's secretary for agriculture and foreign trade, thinks that the government could prevent publication of the virus "recipe" by denying an export license.

Fouchier's study and a similar one by Yoshihiro Kawaoka, DVM, PhD, of the University of Wisconsin in Madison, both deal with lab-modified H5N1 viruses that showed increased transmissibility in ferrets, which are considered the best animal models for studying human influenza. Fouchier submitted his paper to Science and Kawaoka offered his to Nature.

In December the US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) recommended that key details of the two studies not be published out of concern that malefactors could use the data to generate highly dangerous viruses. The two journals have said they would comply if a way can be found to provide the details to scientists with a legitimate need for them.

But at a technical meeting hosted by the World Health Organization (WHO) last month, most of a group of flu experts and public health officials said that publishing the papers in redacted form and sharing the details with a select group would not be workable. They called for publishing the papers in full at a later date, after a campaign to educate the public about the research. Further WHO-hosted meetings are expected.

The Schippers letter offered the parliament (the States-General) a general update on the research by Fouchier and colleagues at Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam. The letter, in Dutch, was posted on a government Web site, and CIDRAP News obtained a translation.

Much of the letter is devoted to describing the outcome of the WHO-hosted meeting on Feb 16 and 17. It says that the prospect of publishing the study raises critical questions about safety and proliferation of dangerous agents.

"Is there a proliferation risk associated with unlocking all research information and, if so, how do the risks relate to the benefits of public health identified by the consensus points of the technical consultation of the WHO?" Schippers wrote. "The Netherlands has insisted that the proliferation risks from releasing this knowledge as well as the advantages for public health have to be carried out first."

The letter then raises the export permit question, stating: "An export permit is required for export of the bird flu virus outside the European Union and for the transmission of detailed information about the virus. For the WHO consultation in Geneva on February 16-17, the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation issued this kind of license to a small group of health experts under strict conditions.

"If an export permit is requested for publication of (parts of) information, the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation will, in his judgment, weigh the interests for health, science and safety risks."

The letter goes on to say that the government seeks a "balanced judgment of this research and the publication of the results," weighing the advantages and disadvantages from all angles.

In response to an e-mailed request today, Fouchier told CIDRAP News he would not comment on the letter.

The Mar 9 story in the Volkskrant was brief. According to a machine translation, the story said the government is "intent on possibilities to prevent the recipe for the new flu virus from Rotterdam" from being shared with the rest of the world.

The story went on to say that Bleker, the secretary for agriculture and foreign trade, "thinks . . . the publication of the recipe can be avoided by refusing an export license." The report added some background information about the research but gave no further information about Bleker's views or intentions.

A spokesman for Blekder did not respond to a request for comment that was sent by e-mail this afternoon.

See also:

Dutch export-control page with link to Schippers letter

Mar 9 Volkskrant story (in Dutch)

Feb 17 CIDRAP News story "WHO H5N1 study group extends moratorium, calls for full publication"

[sharon sanders]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

Wow.

Fouchier and Kawaoka already submitted these papers to journals to be published.

Is an export license required to do that?

The information in these papers is already "out there".

[gsgs]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

it may be "published" in NL, in Europe but not "exported" ??

How do they think it could work in practice, has such a
nationwide secret ever remained secret ?

Once enough people know it, it almost certainly goes
around the world.

[gsgs]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

what i've asked before and never was answered nor did I find it
addressed in TWiV or VRR's or Alan Dove's blog or Palese's papers (why ?),
I finally found it mentioned here:

http://www.lauriegarrett.com/index.php/en/blog/3149/#&panel1-1

> In order to reverse the NSABB fiat Fouchier, his financial supporters
> at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in New York (chiefly Dr. Peter Palese,
> whose lab passed NIH research money
> onto Dutch scientist Fouchier),

so is Palese somehow biased, has he a personal interest
in the results being published ? Maybe his lab wants to do some
research also but is now being hindered ?
Seems to me that Garrett suggests that, but maybe I misunderstood.

[Pathfinder]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

From an earlier post:

"The Dutch government and the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention approved the laboratory, and the National Institutes of Health gave the Erasmus center a seven-year contract for flu research."

"... The research was also commissioned by the American National Institutes of Health (NIH) and therefore also assessed by experts in an international context. Because of the American funding, the researchers not only have to comply with Dutch law and regulations but also with American law and regulations.

http://www.erasmusmc.nl/perskamer/faq-vogelgriep/?lang=en

and this is from an older article of an interview with Fouchier dating of January 20, 2012
If was posted before, hattip to the member.

Source: http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2012/01/flu-researcher-ron-fouchier-its.html

Excerpt:

Q: Have you had requests from other labs to share the virus you have created?

R.F.: Not explicitly. Everybody understands that this is not the right time to ask.

Q: But if they did ask, what would you do?

R.F.: I have an agreement with our funder, the NIAID, that if such requests were made, I will discuss it with them. So I can't decide that on my own.


Another interesting point from this article:

Q: You also want to repeat the experiments with more H5N1 strains?

R.F.: Yes. We did this with one genetic lineage of the H5N1 virus. The question is whether all lineages can become aerosol-transmissible. If they can't, if it's just this lineage, perhaps you can focus on the region where it came from and try to stop H5N1 outbreaks there to prevent a pandemic. If it can happen everywhere, you've got to work everywhere.

Just wondering what will be the future of these experiments?

[gsgs]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

I think someone (China ?) will secretly do the experiments in humans

[gsgs]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

do we have a new thread about this meanwhile ?

live webcast today from London in 2hours

http://www.voiceprompt.co.uk/royalsociety/030412/

Tuesday April 3 at 9:00 a.m. BST (4:00 a.m. EDT , 08:00 UTC, 10:00 CET)

http://www.physorg.com/wire-news/94825676/h5n1-research-symposium-to-be-webcast-live-to-public.html

After the symposium the entire video of the meeting will be made available on demand online for 12 months.

[Emily]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

do we have a new thread about this meanwhile ?

live webcast today from London in 2hours

http://www.voiceprompt.co.uk/royalsociety/030412/

Tuesday April 3 at 9:00 a.m. BST (4:00 a.m. EDT , 08:00 UTC, 10:00 CET)

http://www.physorg.com/wire-news/948...to-public.html

Shiloh has it here in Internet communications. Good to mention it again. I missed the first notice.

[Pathfinder]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

Airborne Bird Flu Virus Studies OK to Publish: US Biosecurity Panel

Kate Kelland and Sharon Begley | April 03, 2012

London/ New York. A US biosecurity panel’s recommendation that two controversial papers on bird flu be published in full is not a reversal of the stand it took last year out of concerns over terrorism, the head of the group said on Monday in London.

“We had new information, confidential information, about benefits of this research, and we also had confidential information about the risks involved,” said Paul Keim of Northern Arizona University, who is the acting chairman of the panel. “And the balance began to change.”
...
The board was unanimous in recommending that the study conducted at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, be published in full. But it split 12-6 in favor of publishing a study from Erasmus Medical Center in the Netherlands. It did not explain the lingering concerns about that research. ...
The WHO had worked for years to persuade Indonesia and other countries to share samples of avian flu, or H5N1, with the international scientific community. Previously, Indonesia had declined to do so under a principle its government called “viral sovereignty,” by which it meant that microbes found in Indonesia belonged to the state and did not have to be shared with outsiders. Indonesia viewed the withholding of the two papers as equivalent to its withholding samples of virus. That raised concerns that if the papers were not published, Indonesia and other countries coaxed into cooperating with the WHO would cease doing so.

“I and many others on the board were worried that if we had a flu outbreak our only hope would be international collaboration,” said Casadevall.

Withholding the papers posed a risk to that collaboration, a risk the biosecurity board viewed as more dangerous than the possibility that terrorists would use the information to create an H5N1 pandemic.
...
Ron Fouchier, who led the Erasmus experiments, said the NSABB decision was “very much to our pleasure.” He and Keim stressed that nothing would be censored in the paper. Instead, the paper to be published by Science will include “clear and explicit” information about the lethality of the mutated virus, which is less than the NSABB originally believed.
...
Full text:

http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/news/airborne-bird-flu-virus-studies-ok-to-publish-us-biosecurity-panel/508962

[gsgs]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

I'm missing the contributions from the Indonesian scientists and labs here.
Not doing the research, is it better than doing it and not publishing it ?

The reasons that are presented surprise me.

New confidential information
International cooperation in case of a pandemic
Increased possible benefits of publishing

but what about estimating the risk in the first place ?
Not so important ?

[mixin]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

It was interesting to hear each speaker present his point of view. Tomorrow should be an even better, with a question and answer session.

There will be additional regulation on this issue, possibly by next year. Hopefully, something like this won't happen again. I suspect we will be pretty familiar with DURC (Dual Use Research Concern) before this is all settled.

Here are the considerations to determine if an experiment falls within the guidelines:

Seven Experiments of Concern:
1. enhance the harmful consequences of a biological agent or toxin
2. disrupt immunity or the effectiveness of an immunization without clinical and/or agricultural justification
3. confer resistance to prophylactic or therapeutic interventions or facilitate their ability to evade detection methodologies.
4. increase the stability, transmissibility or the ability to disseminate a biological agent or toxin.
5. alter the host range or tropism of a biological agent or toxin.
6. enhance the susceptibility of a host population
7. generate a novel pathogenic agent or toxin or reconstitute an eradicated or extinct biological agent.

Here is the link to the United States Government Policy for Oversight of Life Sciences Dual Use Research of Concern (4 pg .pdf)

http://oba.od.nih.gov/oba/biosecurity/PDF/United_States_Government_Policy_for_Oversight_of_DURC_FINAL_version_032812.pdf

Here is the list of the agents and toxins from the policy:

1) Agents and toxins
a) Avian influenza virus (highly pathogenic) :
b) Bacillus anthracis
c) Botulinum neurotoxin
d) Burkholderia mallei
e) Burkholderia pseudomallei
f) Ebola virus
g) Foot-and-mouth disease virus
h) Francisella tularensis
i) Marburg virus
j) Reconstructed 1918 Influenza virus
k) Rinderpest virus
l) Toxin-producing strains of Clostridium botulinum
m) Variola major virus
n) Variola minor virus
o) Yersinia pestis

[Gert van der Hoek]

Re: Man Made H5N1 - Super Version

Free to Speak, Kawaoka Reveals Flu Details While Fouchier Stays Mum

by Martin Enserink on 3 April 2012

LONDON— Influenza virologist Yoshihiro Kawaoka finally told a captive audience here the key details of the study that helped trigger an exhaustive review by a U.S. biosecurity panel as well as one of the most intense bioethical debates in years. Speaking at a 2-day meeting at the Royal Society, Kawaoka revealed the four mutations that made a reassortant flu virus more transmissible among ferrets through tiny droplets—a finding that had triggered worries that it could cause an influenza pandemic.

By contrast, Ron Fouchier of the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands—the main author of the other flu study reviewed by the U.S. National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB)—was forced to stick to a skeletal talk that contained few details about his own work, as he has been doing since he first presented the study at a meeting in Malta in September. The Dutch government is currently holding up the release of Fouchier's study because it believes it might violate export-control rules.

Fouchier doesn't believe the authorities have a case and says he would be "happy to go to court" over the issue, if it weren't for the fact that breaking his silence would also put co-authors and officials at Erasmus MC in legal jeopardy.

ScienceInsider