BU Biolab

And down at Boston Medical Center, here's that project at the corner of Albany St and Mass Ave (Homeless center of some sorts)

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Probably the biggest threat posed by the BU biolab is to the eyes of passersby.
 
The Herald is impressed. Artricle written by Jay Fitzgerald.

Boston University?s anti-bioterrorism lab won?t have Fort Knox-like protections provided by the U.S. Army.

But the controversial $178 million facility, now only a year away from completion, will have a host of impressive security measures.

They include blast-proof exterior walls, airtight labs encased by at least foot-thick reinforced concrete, ?intelligent? video systems that can detect intruders, eye scanners for employees moving about the building, and dozens of state police-trained armed guards patrolling the Albany Street facility, BU officials said yesterday.

Boston University, which is battling critics who say the biolab is too risky to be in the densely populated South End, yesterday gave three Herald staffers one of the first tours of the nearly-completed seven-story building, where Ebola, plague, anthrax and other deadly germs will one day be studied.

The message of the day from BU: security, security, security. For security reasons, officials wouldn?t even allow photographers in the building, which is now about 70 percent complete.

?It?s amazing how many redundancies there are here - and that?s what drives up costs,? said David Flynn, assistant vice president of facilities at BU.

The tour showed that some equipment is already being moved into the federally funded facility, such as high-efficiency air filters designed to prevent escape of non-sterilized particles into the air.

Though none of the labs are completed, the concrete outlines of heavily fortified ?high containment? vaults are visible. Each of the individual Level 4 labs will eventually have inch-thick stainless steel doors with self-sealed ?bladders? around edges to make them airtight.

Each Level 4 lab is surrounded by reinforced concrete and eventually will have inch-thick glass windows. Wearing pressurized suits, no researcher will be allowed to leave a lab without going through a disinfectant shower, said Dr. Jack Murphy, chief of molecular medicine at BU and co-principal ?investigator? for the lab.

Precautions to prevent leakage of germs will be so tight that not even firefighters will be allowed in some rooms during emergencies, Murphy said.

Though BU officials were stressing the facility?s future security features, Shirley Kressel remained unimpressed.

?We don?t have a handle on the safety issues,? said Kressel, a neighborhood activist and critic of the planned lab. ?We need more answers.?
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http://www.bostonherald.com/business/technology/general/view.bg?articleid=1035895

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Fat lot of good it will do!!!

Oh, right, it'll be protected from terrorists ...

BUT WHAT IF A COMET HIT THE EARTH????

They can't protect us from that, now, can they???

SAY NO TO THE BIOLAB!
 
I'd like to put Shirley Kressel in a catapult and fling her into the sea.
 
Kressel on a catapault

I'll second that one!

Better yet -- put her on the comet

Westy
 
From today's Washington Post. This article has less local flavor and more 'meat' with regard to content than the Globe's article today.
Experts 'Fail' Risk Analysis for Boston Bioterror Lab
Activists Welcome the Repudiation of Government's Justification for Project

By Rick Weiss
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 30, 2007; A10

An expert panel of the nation's premier science advisory organization yesterday gave a failing grade to a federal risk analysis used to justify construction of a controversial high-security bioterror laboratory in inner-city Boston.

The report, by the National Research Council of the National Academies, is a significant victory for community activists and others who have opposed construction of the $200 million "biosafety level 4" laboratory, designed to study the world's most dangerous diseases.

It bluntly declares that the science behind the risk analysis -- conducted by the National Institutes of Health, which is funding most of the project -- "is not sound and credible."

"On a pass-fail basis . . . it would have failed," said Gary Smith, chief of public health at the University of Pennsylvania's School of Veterinary Medicine and a member of the committee that conducted the review at the request of the state of Massachusetts.

"If it were a submitted article for a scientific journal, we would have rejected it," committee member Gigi Kwik Gronvall of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's Center for Biosecurity said.

Biosafety level 4 (BSL-4) labs are designed to do studies of biological agents that cause anthrax, smallpox, Ebola and other highly virulent or contagious ailments for which no vaccine or therapy is available. Four such labs are under construction with NIH funding -- all scheduled to be largely complete by next year -- as part of a plan to boost biosecurity research.

The Boston lab, 70 percent complete, is being built in conjunction with Boston University and the Boston Medical Center on the border of the city's South End and its impoverished Roxbury district. Construction is continuing while state and federal lawsuits wend their way through the courts. Federal officials have said that if they lose in court, the facility will be used for experiments on less dangerous microbes.

Yesterday's 28-page report focused on just one aspect of the government's case for the Boston lab: a "Draft Supplementary Risk Assessment and Site Suitability Analysis" written by NIH. Once finalized, that document is to supplement the government's initial Environmental Impact Report, which the Superior Court of Massachusetts declared inadequate in July 2006.

Technically, yesterday's report is but one of many "public comments" that the NIH will consider as it finalizes its risk analysis. Even that analysis will be but one part of the government's overall case that the lab will be safe.

The NRC report "should not be viewed as statements about the risks of proposed biocontainment facilities in Boston, or in cities more generally," the report says. "The Committee acknowledges the need for biocontainment laboratories in the United States, including BSL-4 laboratories, and recognizes that BSL-4 facilities are being operated in other major urban areas."

In a brief statement, NIH officials promised to "consider the comments along with all others."

Activists and their lawyers were less restrained.

"Oh, my God, I'm just so happy," said Klare Allen, a community organizer who has helped lead the legal battle. "The NRC pretty much confirmed everything we've been saying for the last five years."

Among other things, the report criticized the way the NIH compared the potential impact of an accidental microbial release on the high-density Roxbury neighborhood vs. a similar release in a more rural setting. NIH chose to base that analysis on the virus that causes Rift Valley fever, which is spread by mosquitoes and can live in cows.

By choosing that disease instead of one that spreads without cows, the report said, the results made a rural setting for the lab seem more dangerous than the urban site.

Moreover, the NRC said, the analysis did not examine how diseases released by the lab might particularly harm the already unhealthy population in Roxbury, which is designated an "environmental justice" zone and so is entitled to legal protection from actions that might worsen its already poor public health status.

Ellen Berlin, director of corporate communications at Boston University, said it was important that the lab be situated close to the university's medical research campus. "Kind of lost in all this is how important it is to study and find treatments and cures for infectious diseases," Berlin said, adding that "the research can and will be done safely."

The other three NIH BSL-4 labs under construction, none of which faces legal challenges, are at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston; Rocky Mountain Laboratories in Hamilton, Mont.; and Fort Detrick. Other agencies operate at least five other such labs.
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/29/AR2007112902133.html
 
Interesting how everything is political these days
You can't even trust the National Research Council to be a-political
How come the Galveston P-4 is not being subjected to the same scrutiny -- try leaving Galveston Island if there was to be a release -- the only reliable way -- is that you have your own boat tied-up to your own private dock

As to the proposed BU P-4 and its risk to the surroundings ? because of its location near the Expressway and the prevailing winds from the west -- Most of the stuff that could escape would drift out to the harbor without passing through any populated residential district. But in the end ? no one can possibly know what would really happen as it would depend on whether the release was viruses, bacteria, contaminated material, how fine the particles, how it was released, etc. As to the actual matter of the protections against release in the P-4 itself and the outer layers built in to the overall structure ? there is nothing in the National Research Council?s report that calls any of that into question. Ultimately, those are your primary lines of defense ? not whether the building is where it is or out in Marlboro on I-495.

Then there's the ?whole boat-load of manure? about the designated "economic justice" zone and its allegedly "already poor public health status" -- the only thing principally wrong "public health-wise" in that designated "economic justice zone" -- has to do with the reproductive relations of its residents {i.e. un-controlled reproductive relating}. This a-familial tendency has in turn led to a near total breakdown of the fabric of civil society. Ironically the very same well intentioned programs that have given us the ?designated economic justice zones? is to large extent responsible for the bad social state that ???

Just give me a break ? let?s go back to analyzing proposed buildings on the basis of rational and reasonable criteria ? i.e. mostly we let the property owner decide what to build -- except for obvious limits such as no open air boiler factories in a residential area, no huge attractants of attendees without some reasonable means of getting the people to the site, no tank farms for gasoline without containment berms, etc.

On this one I?m on Tommy?s side!

Westy
 
Isn't the CDC's level 4 lab in a fairly populated area of Atlanta? There has never been an accident there as far as I know. Why would a new lab with state of the art security be more of risk?
 
This is a bunch of NIMBY FUD. If Boston really wants to try to position itself to be the Silicon Valley of bio-tech, then this is what comes with the territory. I don't think we can go back to making shoes at this point.

The neighborhood's biggest threat from this lab is the blight caused by the building's heinous design. It looks like a roided-up self storage facility.

Still, assuming this gets OK'ed, if any fearful neighboring South Ender wants to unload their condo at a cut rate price, let me know.
 
P-4 facilities that I know exist in populated areas include:
Atlanta {Center for Disease Control aka {CDC}},
Bethesda MD {National Institute of Health}
Fredrick, MD, {Ft. Detrick US Army}

There are certainly P-3 and possibly P-4 also in:
Bethesda, MD {US Navy}
San Antonio, TX {US Army, US Air Force, SW Biomedical Research Institute}

Another list {some overlap includes London, Hamburg, Chicago among others -- some may only be so-called P-3+ or P-3++ needing a special permit and self contained glovebox within the facility to conduct P-4 level stuff} -- but anyway the list from several semi-reliable sources:


Winnipeg, Manitoba Canadian Science Center for Human and Animal Health

Lyons France Institut Pasteur

Hamburg, Germany Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine.

Solna Sweden Institute for Infection Control

London, UK National Institute for Medical Research
Porton Down, UK Chemical and Ministry of Defence Biological Defence Establishment.

Bethesda, MD NIH Maximum Containment Lab

Frederick, Md Department of Defense (DoD)

San Antonio, Texas Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research
Galveston The University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) including arrangement with NASA for ?extraterrestrial biohazard containment strategies''


two high-security (PC4) labs in Australia played critical roles in identifying new and deadly diseases caused by the Hendra and Ross River viruses.

Botucatu, Brazil

a mile and a half off Long Island's prosperous North Fork, is the site of the Plum Island Animal Disease Center,

Hamilton, MT Rocky Mountain Laboratories (RML) US National Institutes of Health,

Davis, CA University of California Western National Center for Biodefense and Emerging Diseases

Portland, OR Oregon Health and Sciences University

Fort Collins, CO Centers for Disease Control

Dugway, UT US Army Dugway Proving Ground

Richland, WA Pacific US Department of Energy Northwest National Laboratory,

Galveston, TX University of Texas Medical Branch

Lubbock, TX Texas Technological University

Albuquerque, NM University of New Mexico

San Antonio, TX University of Texas Health Science Center

Chicago, IL University of Illinois at Chicago

Manhattan, KS National Agricultural Biosecurity Center Kansas State University

Columbus, OH Center for Biodefense Excellence (Region 5)
Ohio State University / Battelle Memorial Institute

West Jefferson, OH Battelle Memorial Institute

Kansas City, MO Midwest Research Institute

St. Louis, MO St. Louis University

Birmingham, AL Southern Research Institute (SRI) / University of Alabama (UAB)

Oak Ridge, TN Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Research Triangle Park, NC Regional Biocontainment Facility Duke University / University of North Carolina

Nashville, TN Vanderbilt University

Frederick, MD Fort Detrick / National Institutes of Health

Baltimore, MD Middle Atlantic Regional Center of Excellence
Johns Hopkins University / University of Maryland

Aberdeen MD US Army Aberdeen Proving Ground / Battelle Eastern Region Technology Center

Edgewood/Aberdeen, MD U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense

US Navy, Dahlgren, VA Naval Surface Weapons Center

Albany, NY Wadsworth Center New York State Department of Public Health

Buffalo, NY Calspan - UB Research Center

Plum Island, NY Plum Island Animal Disease Center
US Department of Agriculture,

Cambridge MA Harvard University?

It is sounding almost anomolous to not have a P-4 or BLC-4 {new designation} in your city

Westy
 
Without having a copy of the NAS report in hand, there appears to be a disconnect between the Washington Post article and the Globe article on what risk scenario was modeled:
from the Globe:
In its analysis, the 11-member National Research Council's scientific panel expressed particular frustration with the NIH's evaluation of a worst-case scenario for the release of deadly organisms into the South End.

Specifically, the scientists complained that the federal agency had studied the wrong scenarios, looking at germs such as Ebola that can't be transmitted easily, rather than dengue fever, which would pose more of a threat because it is carried by mosquitoes.
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http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/11/30/us_review_of_bu_biolab_inadequate_panel_finds/

The Washington Post said this:
NIH chose to base that analysis on the virus that causes Rift Valley fever, which is spread by mosquitoes and can live in cows.

By choosing that disease instead of one that spreads without cows, the report said, the results made a rural setting for the lab seem more dangerous than the urban site.
Click to expand...

But dengue fever is epidemic in Mexico and the Caribbean.
image.ashx


So studying dengue in Boston does not seem much of a risk given that it is epidemic a short airplane flight away.
 
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Tommy speaks. Tommy promises. Tommy brooks no opposition.

Today's Boston Herald
by Jay Fitzgerald

Mayor Thomas Menino yesterday predicted a controversial anti-bioterrorism lab in the South End will open in about a year - despite a recent blistering report that said a past safety review of the facility was inadequate and border-line incompetent.


?The biolab will go forward,? Menino said yesterday in response to a question after a speech before the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce.


?I have no fear of the biolab,? said Menino, who says the planned $178 million facility will attract top scientists from around world to Boston.


He said he was aware of the recent report by the National Research Council, which harshly criticized the National Institutes of Health?s safety review of the proposed biolab being built by Boston University on its medical campus.


Menino said supporters of the biolab have ?taken those concerns to heart.?
But he said there?s ?nothing we can?t overcome? in order to open the lab in about a year.


The high-security facility, which is 70 percent complete and funded with federal money, will study dangerous germs and other pathogens as part of the nation?s anti-terrorism efforts.


Some have said the National Research Council?s damning report could delay the opening of the lab - and even lead to no highly dangerous ?level 4? germs being studied at the facility.


A staff attorney for the Conservation Law Foundation, which is suing to stop the project until a thorough environmental study is conducted, said Menino?s comments yesterday were ?deeply irresponsible.?


?I didn?t know the mayor is a scientist and a risk-analysis expert,? said the CLF?s Eloise Lawrence, accusing Menino of ?pure posturing? on the issue.


In separate remarks at the chamber event yesterday, Menino said:
He?s still determined to move City Hall from City Hall Plaza to the South Boston Waterfront, freeing up valuable downtown property for future development.


His administration, as the Herald reported yesterday, will launch next spring a new ?green collar jobs? initiative that includes a $500 million revolving loan program, which would use private money to encourage property owners to retrofit their buildings to make them more energy efficient.
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http://www.bostonherald.com/business/general/view.bg?articleid=1050223
 
Ruling may stall opening of biolab

SJC says permit wrongly issued Facility would deal with deadly germs

By Stephen Smith, Globe Staff | December 14, 2007
The state's highest court delivered a victory yesterday to opponents of a controversial research laboratory being built by Boston University, upholding a lower-court decision that cast doubt on whether the project will open on time next year.


In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Judicial Court agreed that the state's environmental approval of the South End lab, granted by the Romney administration, was "arbitrary and capricious."


The SJC also concurred that BU must complete another environmental review of the project and submit it to the state for approval.


Yesterday's decision does not halt construction of the facility, already 70 percent complete, but does call into question when or whether BU will receive the permits necessary to open the centerpiece of the building: a Biosafety Level-4 lab where scientists will be able to work with the world's deadliest germs, including Ebola, plague, and anthrax.


Douglas Wilkins, a lawyer representing lab opponents, said yesterday that he believes that the SJC decision means BU "can't go forward with using this facility for a Level-4 lab because they need state permits and they can't get them. I think they're dead in the water at the moment."


In a statement, the university said: "The biosafety lab and the research it conducts will save and not endanger lives. We are confident that the additional environmental impact study will satisfy the court."


The SJC decision represents the second time in two weeks that environmental reviews of the BU project have been lambasted. An independent panel of scientists declared two weeks ago that a federal review of the lab was "not sound and credible" and failed to adequately address the consequences of lethal germs escaping.


In yesterday's decision, the justices offer a scathing assessment of the state's original environmental approval process, declaring that it failed to adequately consider alternative sites or weigh worst-case scenarios for release of viruses or bacteria. BU conducted the original environmental analysis, which was reviewed and approved by the state.


The state's 2004 approval "lacked a rational basis because the evaluation of the 'worst case' scenario was significantly incomplete," the high court justices said.


The original review analyzed the potential escape of only one pathogen, anthrax, which, while deadly, cannot be transmitted person to person.
That report, the SJC wrote, "failed to analyze the likely damage to the environment caused by the release of a contagious pathogen, whether through laboratory accident, escape of an infected research animal, theft, terrorism, or transportation mishap, which is a critical consideration in a densely populated urban area."


The project, known as the National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories, is being built on Albany Street and represents a bid by BU to vault into the top tier of the nation's medical research institutions. Underwritten by federal funds, the laboratory, scheduled to open next fall, is a cornerstone in the Bush administration's campaign to prepare for potential acts of bioterrorism.


Ten Roxbury and South End residents sued in state court to block the project, prompting the July 2006 ruling by Suffolk Superior Court Judge Ralph D. Gants that led to the demand for an expanded environmental review. BU appealed that decision to the SJC.


As part of the state review, BU is required to submit an update of its own analysis of the project's safety risks. A BU spokeswoman said she was uncertain when the update will be finished.


Robert Keough, a spokesman for the state Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, described yesterday's ruling as significant.


Klare Allen, a resident who has taken to the streets and the courts to battle the proposed lab, said that the SJC ruling was a "wonderful thing."
"There really isn't anything that anybody can show that proves we are safe with this facility in our community," said Allen, a community organizer for the activist group Safety Net.
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http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/12/14/ruling_may_stall_opening_of_biolab/

Looks as if BU has to re-do its environmental review.
 
looks like a bland version of the MIT Brain Sciences building. Maybe they wanted it to look as innocuous as possible so picketers couldn't find it....
 
unterbau said:
looks like a bland version of the MIT Brain Sciences building. Maybe they wanted it to look as innocuous as possible so picketers couldn't find it....
Click to expand...

It looks that way because it is a containment facility. Sort of like building a Super-Max facility (most secure Federal prison) for pathogens.

There is a British report on Level 4 pathogens, with descriptions of how they are spread. List starts on p. 17 of the pdf.

http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/Publication...ions/PublicationsPolicyAndGuidance/DH_4135258

The list reveals why anthrax is as good a pathogen as any to evaluate in a review; i.e., it can be an airborne pathogen. Nearly all the others on the list require an intermediate host to become infected. (There are several that can spread through direct human-human contact with bodily fluids.)
 
Does having this in the middle of the city help anyone other than BU? I understand the desire to have something like this in a central location, but considering the level of security we see at gov't facilities like Los Alamos, is it really that crazy to expect something to get out?
 
The BU Biolab facility ? only a small part of which is the P-4 level containment -- provides a central point for a concentration of related industry, support facilities, shops, restaurants and in short ? jobs for both local residents and suburban commuters.

Over the next decade this facility will catalyze surrounding development {supported with hopefully better transportation options}. All in all the new complex will consume immense quantities of exotic things like paper, toner, sandwiches, perhaps a few bottles of champagne. There will need to be people around to supply the consumable materials, take Fedex deliveries to Logan, pick-up and deliver visitors, fix the copiers and configure the plethora of wireless, wired and fibered networks

This BU lab will become the nucleus of another Cambridge Center / Kendall Square or the complex surrounding Harvard Medical School. The only issue involved is that -- BU not Haaaaavaaaahd or MIT is involved. If it were the latter two -- then no one would have brooked any opposition.

In this one -- I applaud Big Tom -- well done Mr. Mayor.

Westy
 
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not the best lighting, but does it matter? This thing sucks no matter how you look at it.

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I just can't help but be simple minded about this one. You don't want the world's most deadly diseases being tinkered with in the middle of the city. What happens if a fire happens, or insect infestation, or flooding caused by a hurricane? NIMBY's, of all things that are meaningless that you protest, here is one with serious validity. I think that this lab would be better located in a near by suburb.
 
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