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ScienceInsider: A Flawed Flu Papers Process?

 

 

# 6283

 

 

The `must read’ for today comes from the pen of CIDRAP director and NSABB  board member Michael Osterholm in a letter to the Associate Director for Science Policy at the NIH where he critiques the NSABB’s recent reversal of their previously unanimous decision to block the full publication of Ron Fouchier’s controversial H5N1 ferret studies.


Of the eighteen members who voted again on the issue, twelve recommended publication while six did not.  Osterholm voted in the minority.

 

Jon Cohen writing for Science’s ScienceInsider provides the background, in his report:

 

 

A Flawed Flu Papers Process?

by Jon Cohen on 13 April 2012, 4:26 PM

 

Last month, one-third of the members of the U.S. National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) disagreed with the group's recommendation to publish in full two studies that describe how to make the bird flu virus transmissible in mammals. Now one of the six dissenters, influenza epidemiologist Michael Osterholm of the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, has written a sharp critique of the meeting that led to the decision. In a letter sent yesterday to Amy Patterson, an official at the U.S. National Institutes of Health whose office oversees NSABB, Osterholm charged that the meeting was "designed to produce the outcome that occurred."

(Continue . . .)

 

Osterholm’s 7-page letter is available  HERE - and regardless where you stood on the publication of Fouchier’s research - Osterholm calls into serious question many aspects of the NSABB review process that should be of concern to all of us.


Helen Branswell has even more on all of this in her recently updated Canadian Press story:

 

Updated: April 13, 2012 | 6:39 pm

Flu expert slams bird flu panel process

By Helen Branswell The Canadian Press

 



In a world where we can now create `designer’ organisms in the laboratory, the biosecurity issues facing life sciences research are becoming increasingly complex. While the benefits of this kind of work may prove enormous, the risks are not trivial.

 

Despite reassurances from researchers, mistakes, laboratory accidents, and even intentional misuse of these new technologies are always possible.

 

Against this backdrop, public confidence in science and scientists continues to deteriorate (see Science at the Crossroads). Already there is a good deal of public resistance to the use of GM (Genetically Modified) food crops, and bio-engineered organisms, and the anti-vaccine movement continues to thrive.

 

If this type of research is to have a viable future, then it must first engender the public’s trust.

 

And based on their handling of this controversy over the past few months, the scientific community has got a long way to go.

Related Post:

H5N1

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