Quick post this morning…. great article from the New York Times Magazine on preparedness for bioterror.
One of the best concepts in the article is that of the bioterror ‘reload’. Coined by Richard Danzig, former Secretary of the Navy under Clinton, the term refers to a key difference between biological weapons and other WMDs. If a terrorist organization acquires a nuclear, radiological, or even chemical device, for the most part, they have a device. With biologicals, the threat is a terrorist organization acquiring not a single device or stockpile, but the capability to produce biological weapons. This available supply creates an continual threat, which in turn drives the critical need for effective and available vaccines. While countermeasures and antibiotics offer some protection, only vaccines can ultimately nullify the threat.
The article describes several vaccine programs, some of which are not pretty (politically) to read about. It’s a long read, but well worth your time.
How Ready Are We for Bioterrorism?.
I liked how they talked about the conflicting approaches, the military approach of developing specific responses to specific bioweapon threats, vs. the more all hazards approach of the public health field. Considering the E. coli outbreak in Germany earlier this year, not to mention the influenza roulette we’ve seen over the last few years, there are certainly some relatively unknown and unanticipated threats out there.
Posted by churchcr | 27 October 2011, 19:32