Deadly Germ Labs Unchecked

Unregulated laboratories are experimenting with potentially deadly germs, increasing public risk in a system that relies on self-reporting of accidents, congressional investigators said Thursday.

Operators of the labs are the only people who know whether a few known cover-ups of accidents "are the tip of the iceberg or the iceberg itself," said Keith Rhodes, a Government Accountability Office expert on lab research.

No government agency knows the total number of such labs or tries to keep track of them, the GAO told a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee.

The number of labs is expanding, in large part because of a beefed up counterterrorism effort to develop vaccines and treatments for biological agents that could be used in an attack.

Yet, even the FBI and intelligence agencies are unable to keep track of the proliferating labs, Rhodes said. Only the 409 labs working with at least one of 72 germs and toxins - designated by the government as "Select Agents" - are registered and must report accidents.

Beyond those labs there is "an informational black hole," Rhodes said.

The major known cover-up came at Texas A&M, where lab officials failed to report worker exposures to Brucella bacteria and Q fever. One worker became seriously ill but recovered.

More labs mean "more people who possibly could be compromised ... and the more material you have to move," Rhodes said.

"The fact that there is so much unknown at the moment, I would have to say there is a greater risk" to the public, he added.

The Associated Press reported this week that American laboratories handling the world's deadliest germs and toxins have experienced more than 100 accidents and missing shipments since 2003, and the number is increasing as more labs do the work.

No one died, and regulators said the public was never at risk during these incidents. But the documented cases reflect poorly on procedures and oversight at high-security labs. In some cases, labs have failed to report accidents as required by law.

Lab accidents, ranging from skin cuts to animal bites, result mostly from "human error due to carelessness, inadequate training or poor judgment," Rhodes said.

He said the GAO found "a disincentive to report acquired infections and other mishaps at research institutions."

The reasons, he said, are "negative publicity for the institution or the scrutiny from a granting agency, which might result in the suspension of research, or an adverse effect on future funding."

"Further, it is generally believed that when a worker acquires an infection in the lab, it is almost always his or her fault, and neither the worker nor the lab is interested in negative publicity," he said.

Dr. Richard Besser, the CDC's terrorism and emergency response coordinator, says the agency's regulation of the labs is under review by an internal watchdog.

Besser's said the Health and Human Services inspector general will issue his report next year.

"We need improvements in our inspection process," Besser said.

Labs are routinely inspected by the CDC just once every three years, but accidents and changes in research trigger new inspections.