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List of Laboratory Biosecurity Incidents

25 points by steelstraw 5y ago

systemvoltage 5y ago
I think we need to think about these Labs like NRC thinks about nuclear technology. Possibly even more seriously than Nuclear risks. The consequences of COVID-19 whether lab leak or not, is 15 million lives and $50 Trillion in economic damage. Not to mention, it changed the world forever and upended many lives. We need to establish Biosecurity commission 100x the strictness of nuclear tech.
- fastaguy88 5y ago
  If Covid19 was not a lab leak (and their is no strong evidence that it was, mostly just what if's), then it would make more sense to spend more money on research to understand non-human zoonotic viruses, and rather than effectively reducing the research budget by shifting money to biohazard security. Some of the listed lab releases did not infect anyone, and very few infected even a dozen people. I think it makes more sense to spend money to understand natural hazards we know exist, and could potentially prevent/reduce if we did more research.
  - systemvoltage 5y ago
    > I think it makes more sense to spend money to understand natural hazards we know exist, and could potentially prevent/reduce if we did more research. This is being debated quite vigoriously lately by reputable virologists and the scientific community in general. My personal bystander opinion is that the ROI is far less than what these grants propose and the risk is far more than what was promised.
    - fastaguy88 5y ago
      I suspect that the risk depends on the kind of research. There are certainly arguments that gain of function research has high risks, and culturing lots of zoonotic viruses requires precautions, but what about a metagenomic analysis of zoonotic virus samples? In general, I suspect that most researchers hope for breakthroughs that rarely occur, but it's science, so the ROI may be highly uncertain.
mrkramer 5y ago
Ebola, Zika, SARS-COV-2 Delta Variant.... Why is world blind to these biosecurity incidents and lab leaks? This is beyond insane.

25 points by steelstraw 5y ago

I think we need to think about these Labs like NRC thinks about nuclear technology. Possibly even more seriously than Nuclear risks. The consequences of COVID-19 whether lab leak or not, is 15 million lives and $50 Trillion in economic damage. Not to mention, it changed the world forever and upended many lives. We need to establish Biosecurity commission 100x the strictness of nuclear tech.

fastaguy88 5y ago
If Covid19 was not a lab leak (and their is no strong evidence that it was, mostly just what if's), then it would make more sense to spend more money on research to understand non-human zoonotic viruses, and rather than effectively reducing the research budget by shifting money to biohazard security. Some of the listed lab releases did not infect anyone, and very few infected even a dozen people. I think it makes more sense to spend money to understand natural hazards we know exist, and could potentially prevent/reduce if we did more research.
- systemvoltage 5y ago
  > I think it makes more sense to spend money to understand natural hazards we know exist, and could potentially prevent/reduce if we did more research. This is being debated quite vigoriously lately by reputable virologists and the scientific community in general. My personal bystander opinion is that the ROI is far less than what these grants propose and the risk is far more than what was promised.
  - fastaguy88 5y ago
    I suspect that the risk depends on the kind of research. There are certainly arguments that gain of function research has high risks, and culturing lots of zoonotic viruses requires precautions, but what about a metagenomic analysis of zoonotic virus samples? In general, I suspect that most researchers hope for breakthroughs that rarely occur, but it's science, so the ROI may be highly uncertain.

mrkramer 5y ago

Ebola, Zika, SARS-COV-2 Delta Variant.... Why is world blind to these biosecurity incidents and lab leaks? This is beyond insane.