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I'm curious a to why this vaccine has been worked in at Los Alamos which is a national security orientated government laboratory. (US government, of course) On
by dotBen 16y ago
I'm curious a to why this vaccine has been worked in at Los Alamos which is a national security orientated government laboratory. (US government, of course)
On the one hand it makes sense - AIDS/HIV is a national security issue in many ways - I just wonder what that means for everyone outside of the US. If the US government owns the vaccine, are they going to share it openly and without prejudice to any other countries that want it? Even Iran?
But it also makes you wonder, then, whether there is merit in donating to AIDS/HIV research charities if any significant break-throughs are going to be snapped up by the government as matters for national security.
- danenania 16y agoEven if they wanted to, there's no way they could keep it in their control. Medical researchers aren't soldiers; if a cure was found and the government was crazy enough to try to control it, instructions for synthesizing it would be on the web in five seconds.
- wgrover 16y agoI think there's an easier explanation than national security. There's a huge variety of research going on at all the National Labs. Their place within the Department of Energy motivates the development of unique energy-related resources (supercomputing, particle accelerators, you name it) which then find uses in fields like biology. At first glance, it looks like LANL's computing expertise facilitated this vaccine research.
- dotBen 16y agoVery probably. Point still stands though, what's the point of funding independent AIDS/HIV research if the government is funding it on a national security agenda. Given this audience, perhaps that's rhetorical question - but I thought worth asking.