The author looks at possible defensive measures, including expanded bio-surveillance, against the growing threat of agro-terrorism.
Concerns about bioterrorism and infectious diseases have prompted Boston and a growing number of other cities to start electronic tracking systems to quickly detect outbreaks. By compiling data from emergency rooms, poison control centers and other sources, ``syndromic surveillance'' can both serve as an early warning system and help eliminate false alarms, health officials say.
severe lack of funding for surveillance and front-line defenses has left the World Health Organization unprepared to deal with a global bioterrorist attack involving an agent such as smallpox, according to a senior official who monitors disease outbreaks for the agency.
Citing the ongoing outbreak of a deadly respiratory illness, U.S. senators proposed spending $150 million to strengthen the world's radar system for detecting disease outbreaks.
New York City has developed a disease outbreak early warning system, dubbed the Syndromic Surveillance System, which public health experts call the most advanced early warning system in the country. Amid growing national concern about bioterrorism and the spread of exotic diseases, a number of cities have become interested in this field, and many have called New York, hoping to learn how it is done.
The United States and the rest of the world need to do a lot more to protect people against microbes like the one causing a mysterious and deadly form of pneumonia, as well as more traditional foes like influenza and tuberculosis, according to a panel of experts from the U.S. Institute of Medicine.
The authors warn that Saddam Hussein is capable of unleashing 'biological Armageddon' if trapped into a corner. They argue that the U.S. can defend against biological blackmail by boosting resources for disease detection networks and by training and placing more intelligence agents knowledgeable in this type of warfare throughout the world.
Public health experts and computer scientists have been developing software for more rapid surveillance and detection of outbreaks, partly to respond to the threat of biological terrorism.
Even though the United States has the most extensive disease surveillance and response system in the world, there are gaps in its ability to detect outbreaks early, as the 1999 West Nile virus outbreak illustrated.
Al Zelicoff, a senior scientist at Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico, warned Utah researchers that the Biological Weapons Convention has failed and the U.S. has no defense against biological warfare. He urged the development of an international network to monitor unusual disease outbreaks as a way of controlling and deterring biological weapons research.