duty to publish details of lethal man-made flu that could kill half the people it infects

Duty to publish details of lethal man-made flu that could kill half the people it infects





Science journal editor says it is his duty to publish details of
lethal man-made flu that could kill half the people it infects 'in
complete form'

• H5N1 bird flu virus kills half of humans that contract it
  
• Research into more contagious forms of virus
  
• Editor says 'we have to publish in complete form'
  
• Insists publication is essential to create vaccine
  

The editor of a leading science journal
has said that it is hi duty to publish details of controversial
research into a mutant H5N1 bird flu virus.

Far deadlier than normal flu, the H5N1
strain kills roughly half of humans that contract it, but so far the
virus has been mainly restricted to poultry. Scientists have researched
mutations which make it more contagious.

Dr Bruce Alberts, editor of Science,
did not publish after officials from the U.S. National Science Advisory
Board for Biosecurity intervened, in an unprecedented move, warning of
the risks if the virus fell into the hands of 'those who would seek to
do harm.'

Alberts says, 'Our position is we have to publish in complete form.'







Deadly: The new man-made genetic mutation of the lethal H5N1 virus can be transmitted by coughs and sneezesAlberts
says, 'In the absence of any mechanism to get the information to those
scientists who need to protect their populations and to design new
treatments and vaccines, our default position is that we have to
publish in compete form.'


Scientists believe that publishing the details of the research is essential to developing flu vaccines.
Alberts says creating a vaccine is essential in case the strain evolved in the wild.
'This is likely to happen at some point in the wild because these viruses are mutating very actively in the wild,' says Alberts.

A World Health Organisation summit in Geneva this week is discussing the problem.
Experts warn that whatever the outcome
of the meeting, censorship will not stop scientists getting the tools
to create and release a pandemic H5N1 virus if they were intent on
doing so.


It doesn't matter how much you
restrict scientists from doing good, bad people can still do bad
things,' said Wendy Barclay, an expert in flu virology at Imperial
College London.

The WHO called the 'closed door'
meeting, set to begin Friday in Geneva, to break a deadlock between
scientists and U.S. biosecurity chiefs.

American officials want to censor the
work of two research teams, one in the Netherlands and one in the U.S.,
who have found that just a small number of mutations would allow
deadly H5N1 to spread between mammals like ordinary flu.

The United Nations health body has said
it is 'deeply concerned about the potential negative consequences' if
the findings were to make their way into the public domain.


On January 20, flu scientists from
around the world declared a 60-day moratorium on any research involving
H5N1 that could produce more contagious forms of the virus.

At this week's meeting, the researchers
who made the findings and the editors of Science and Nature, the two
journals asked to withhold publication, will meet officials from the
U.S. National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) which
asked for the papers to be censored.

Keiji Fukuda, the WHO's Assistant
Director-General for Health Security and Environment, who will chair
the meeting, says he would like to secure agreement on whether the
studies should be published, in full or part, and who should have
access to them.

The findings are seen as vital for
scientists to be able to develop vaccines, diagnostic tests and
anti-viral drugs that could be deployed in the event of an H5N1
pandemic.

'It is important that research on these
viruses should continue,' Mr Fukuda told Reuters. 'They do pose a
risk. There's a lot of things we don't know about them.

'The question is not really should we
continue to do research ... but under what conditions can we do it so
we don't unnecessarily create fears and risks.'

First detected in Hong Kong in 1997,
the H5N1 virus remains entrenched among poultry in many countries,
mainly in Asia, but so far remains hard for humans to catch.

It is known to have infected nearly 700
people worldwide since 2003, killing half of them, making it far more
deadly than the H1N1 swine flu which caused a pandemic in 2009/2010.

Ron Fouchier, the scientist leading the
Dutch team that gave H5N1 various genetic mutations and made it
transmissible in mammals, argues the research must be published.







Bring out your dead: A Pakistani health official removes chickens from an H5N1 infected farm in Gadap, PakistanHe
says it could help public health officials better prepare for a
scenario where the virus mutates and becomes more deadly, spreading
from person to person via coughs and sneezes.

He has also said other research teams
around the world are close to the same findings, some of them
inadvertently, and should be warned in advance how the virus could
become airborne.

In the short term, most scientists
agree the moratorium is 'a good gesture,' as flu expert and former WHO
health security adviser David Heymann describes it, one that offers the
research community space to think.

Still, Mr Heymann, Ms Barclay and many
other scientists argue that stopping this type of research into flu
viruses and other potentially lethal pathogens would set a dangerous
precedent.



'This flu strain has
the potential to cause such enormous damage, and it's important to know
how far away we are from a horrible event like that'

John Edmunds, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Although adding and deleting genes can
create super-strains that put the entire world at risk, Heymann said,
the work is vital to developing effective vaccines and diagnostic tests
which will be needed quickly if a pandemic hits.

Stopping the research would prevent
researchers from using all possible scientific options to prepare for
naturally occurring, or deliberately caused, outbreaks.

John Edmunds, head of infectious
disease epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical
Medicine, says studies on mutations of H5N1 are 'important work' that
must go on.

'This flu strain has the potential to
cause such enormous damage, and it's important to know how far away we
are from a horrible event like that,' he said.







Source:- www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2101437/Editor-science-journal-says-ready-publish-details-lethal-man-flu-complete-form.html