08.23.10
Bioterrorism Boogiemen
A short companion piece to Jason’s over at Armchair Generalist.
At Steve Aftergood’s Secrecy blog, I point you to the publication of a transcript from the House Foreign Affairs committee in March. The hearing was on countering bioterrorism, complete with all the pro forma scripting on apocalyptic disaster.
The history of congressional discussion of the threat of bioterrorism has always been a bad business. When it’s time to discuss threats and risk management, the only people who get called are generally lobbyists for the bioterror defense business, people who can be counted on to immediately call for more bioterrorism funding, recite various frightful scenarios, and talk about how — under no circumstances — should the United States allow on-site verifications in the Biological Weapons Convention.
This transcript and its bag of bad-faith witnesses, with the sole exception of the Monterey Institute’s Jonathan Tucker, was no different. As usual, the process is almost entirely rigged, allowing for staged recitations and no critical questioning, only more raids on the taxpayer for the benefit of a security industry.
Rather than take it apart piece-by-piece, it’s more illuminating to contrast statements from the various witnesses and politicians with events happening right now in the real world.
“As I said, biological science has led to great advances in addressing our food shortages and [in the development of] famine resistant crops. However, the agriculture sector in our nation’s food supply can be a very enticing targets for acts of bioterrorism.
As our agriculture sector, as I mentioned, is known as the bread basket of the world, it is important to note that any attack on the food supply could have devastating effects for the rest of the world.” — David Scott, D. Georgia
A sudden outbreak of salmonella has prompted a third recall by some of the biggest egg producers in the country in only two weeks. The Food and Drug Administration (F.D.A.) has warned that hundreds of millions of eggs may be affected. Ironically, this latest food safety breakdown is happening only a few weeks after new guidelines for egg production were issued by the agency. Now federal health officials say that contamination with salmonella in eggs may be a more serious problem than they had anticipated at the time when the new rules were established …
Consumer advocates and animal rights activists have long pointed to industrialized farming facilities as potential breeding grounds for bacterial contamination of egg-laying hens … — a Seattle newspaper
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Democratic leaders on the House Energy and Commerce Committee want more information surrounding the recall of more than half a billion eggs potentially contaminated with salmonella.
In letters to Iowa’s Hillandale Farms and Wright County Egg, Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), chairman of the committee, and Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), who heads the committee’s oversight subpanel, requested a long list of details about the companies’ operations and a response to the contamination.
Among the requested data, the lawmakers want to see “a description of the identity and source of that contamination;” documents “sufficient to show all … internal protocols and standards for monitoring and analysis;” and “all documents relating to any allegation of violation of any health, safety, environmental, or animal cruelty laws.”
Waxman and Stupak have requested the information by Sept. 7.
Earlier this month, both companies launched voluntary recalls of eggs they discovered could be tainted with salmonella. The episode “is the largest egg recall that we’ve had in recent history,” Margaret Hamburg, head of the Food and Drug Administration, said Monday on NBC’s “Today Show.”
No one has died from the contamination, federal health officials have emphasized, but hundreds have fallen ill. — The Hill
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Envision 10 terrorists spreading highly weaponized anthrax in ten cities around the world: Nairobi, Warsaw, Tokyo, Mexico City, etc. Assume not a single American is touched by any of these attacks, none of which happen on American soil. Would anyone suggest that we are unharmed?
“If instead, a smallpox pandemic is ignited , killing perhaps millions worldwide, if Americans are effectively immunized, does that mean that we are ok? …
“Finally, allow me to ask you all, what would Congress do in the wake of biocatastrophes that relegate every other policy priority to insignificance?” … — fearmonger Barry Kellman, International Security and Biopolicy Institute, a small lobbying group of lawyers with virtually no science background
After the January 2010 earthquake in Haiti, which displaced 1 million people and came as the U.S. economy continued to crumble, the American Red Cross joined with U.S. cell phone carriers to give Americans the ability to donate a few dollars by sending a simple text message. The campaign raised $31 million within days, generating as much as $200,000 per hour, a relatively small piece of the $2.5 billion that relief groups would raise for Haiti by late March. Some aid groups warned that they were so awash in cash they were incapable of distributing it all.
In August 2010, a similar text message campaign was launched in response to the flooding in Pakistan, which has so far displaced 5 million people and put 13 million, particularly children, at risk of water-borne diseases such as cholera because they lack access to clean drinking water. The United Nations has declared the flooding, which is expected to worsen, already worse than the Haiti earthquake, the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, and the 2005 Kashmir earthquake combined. But the Red Cross’s recent text message effort yielded only $10,000, about 0.03 percent of what it earned for Haiti.
The disappointing campaign has been another in a series of alarming reports from aid groups and even the United Nations that they do not have enough money …
As many in the U.S. have pointed out, the flooding in Pakistan has received light and undramatic TV news coverage relative to Haiti and other humanitarian disasters. The New York Times’ Neil MacFarquhar described the floods as not being as sufficiently “dramatic, emotional, [or] telegenic” as the earthquakes and tsunamis that so opened American wallets. Others have described the floods as a “slow motion” disaster that cannot be effectively conveyed in a single photograph or piece of video — The Atlantic
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The worst floods in Pakistan’s history washed out independence day celebrations Saturday, as the U.N. confirmed the waterborne disease cholera has been found in the disaster zone.
U.N. officials confirmed the first case of cholera in Mingora, in the northwestern district of Swat. Other cases of the deadly disease are suspected and aid workers are treating thousands of cases of acute watery diarrhea. — Voice of America
“There was also great concern about [inspections resulting in false positives]; that unlike the nuclear area, unlike the chemical area, the things that biological weapons inspectors would be looking for — you know, an anthrax spore…
These things occur in nature. Highly enriched uranium does not occur in nature. If an inspector goes to a lab and finds highly enriched uranium, there is not a legitimate reason for that … In the biological area, when we are dealing with germs of one type or another, they could be man made or naturally occurring. So the fact that inspectors detect something really does not tell you much.” — Stephen Rademaker, a lawyer/lobbyist for the bioterrorism defense industry, in an argument for prohibiting any inspection regimes for biological weaponry
In December 2001, Fort Detrick was busily engaged in analyzing contaminated mail. And it was during this period that a number of anthrax contaminations occurred at the facility, surprisingly reported by Bruce Ivins. At the time, the contaminations were attributed to minor negligence and complacency.
However, only in hindsight do they apparently point to something greater and one can speculate that this is what contributed to the FBI suspecting Ivins.
An Army report on the contaminations said that Ivins had indeed discovered anthrax contaminations but had not reported them. And he had started doing the unauthorized samplings in December 2001 …
Ivins undertook the disinfection of contaminated surfaces with bleach. And he set about another round of unauthorized samplings, including his office, as late as April 15, 2002.
Col. David L. Hoover, the Army scientist who had prepared the report on contamination at Fort Detrick, could not determine where the anthrax came from …. The Army apparently asked Ivins to explain further unauthorized samplings in April of 2002 …
Of course, perhaps this is all circumstantial … Or maybe it pointed to someone attempting to feverishly cover their tracks. — me, at the Register