Boston University's (BU) recently-constructed Biosafety Level-4 (BSL-4) laboratory has raised concerns among local residents and academics who question the new building's ability to facilitate the safe study of dangerous pathogens that have no known cure.
Located on the campus of the BU Medical Center, the National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories (NEIDL) was completed in late 2008 after three years of construction. The lab is designed to allow researchers to study infectious and often life-threatening diseases and pathogens, including smallpox, Ebola and anthrax.
The American Biological Safety Association gives labs with a level-4 designation permission to work with "dangerous and exotic agents that pose a high individual risk of aerosol-transmitted laboratory infections, agents which cause severe to fatal disease in humans." At present, there are no vaccines or treatments available for illnesses caused by BSL-4 agents.
Located on BU's medical campus in Boston's densely populated South End, the lab has led many community members to fear for their safety. There are 50,000 residents within one mile of the site.
"They are working with pathogens for which there is no known cure, which could potentially be turned into biological weapons," Vicky Steinitz, co-coordinator of the Greater Boston Committee of the Coalition to Stop the BioTerror Lab, told the Daily. "In theory, these are biodefense labs. But to learn how to cure against these weapons, you essentially have to weaponize them."
NEIDL officials have assured the public that bioweapons research is illegal and they will not engage in research related to biological weaponry.
"We've repeatedly stated that this is a center for studying re-emerging biological diseases for which there are no cure," BU Medical Campus Spokesperson Ellen Berlin told the Daily. "The sole purpose is to conduct and improve health, and we will not be studying biological weapons."
Plans for the biolab got underway in 2003, but it was not until later that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) selected the BU campus over five other sites to host a National Biocontainment Laboratory.
Steinitz felt that BU officials chose the South End specifically because of its demographics. "This lab would never be placed in a middle-class area, the citizens wouldn't stand for it," Steinitz said. "I think the assumption was that this was a low-income neighborhood of color, and people wouldn't have the power to protest it."
An initial risk assessment run in July 2007 concluded that the lab would pose no risk to the surrounding urban community. But this assessment was deemed "not sound and credible" in November 2007 after community protesters commissioned the National Research Council to run a second risk analysis.
A third risk assessment, run by risk analysis company Tetra Tech, Inc., is currently underway and expected to be completed by 2010.
NEIDL is proceeding with safety and training exercises using non-live agents to test the lab's standard operating procedures. Lab staff has already begun training to work in a BSL-4 environment and are preparing to apply for a research grant to study the pathogens.
Berlin expressed confidence in the lab's ability to maintain a safe environment for its neighbors. "BU has long been a research medical institution, and we have the expertise and the experience to operate this institution safely," she said.
Steinitz said that community members were misled by BU administrators.
"BU started out by calling this a lab to research common diseases like tuberculosis, but it's not that at all," Steinitz said. "Tuberculosis does not require a level 4 lab."
Alan Meyers, associate professor of pediatrics at BU's School of Medicine and primary care pediatrician at Boston Medical Center, had a similar experience with the lines of communication.
"Clearly the forces that wanted to have this happen did not want to hear the general BU medical community's dissent," Meyers told the Daily. "The voices of opposition are really not welcome."
Berlin emphasized that the lab will maintain complete transparency in its research. "[The community] will know what we're studying," she said. "There is no secret or classified research, and all our studies will be published in peer-reviewed medical journals."
