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October 21, 2002

U.S. IMMUNIZATION NEWS

"The Technology of Mega Terror"

Technology Review (www.technologyreview.com) (09/02) Vol. 105, No. 7, P. 64; Garwin, Richard L.

The author of this article, Richard Garwin, with his vast experience working on nuclear weaponry and for the White House President's Science Advisory Committee, warns that bioattacks pose the biggest threat to national security today, in particular, those utilizing contagious agents such as smallpox. However, potentially more harmful than smallpox, which though having no cure can be vaccinated against, are other toxins such as Burkholderia mallei, a bacterium that causes a deadly ailment called glanders, for which no vaccine exists.  Though officially, only Russia and the United States were supposed to have kept stocks of smallpox under the 1972 Biological Warfare Convention, it is believed that some researchers in the United States and elsewhere may not have destroyed their reserves, and furthermore, there is proof that Russia had weaponized smallpox for use in ballistic missiles.  To protect against bioattacks, public indoor and work places should install high-efficiency filters and maintain positive pressure to make sure that leaked air flows out instead of in.  "Dirty bombs" utilizing radioactive material also are a threat, though the detonation of such a device would cause little more damage than the conventional explosion used to spread the radioactivity.  More harmful effects would result from the panic that would ensue if such a device was used and the contamination of large areas that may become uninhabitable for years.  A much larger threat comes from the possible terrorist acquisition of nuclear explosives, either through theft or through purchase on the black market.  The United States is currently working closely with Russia to dilute the ex-Soviet nation's hundreds of tons of highly-enriched uranium to make the material useless for the manufacture of nuclear weapons.

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