New York City officials, are determined to set up a network of constantly-monitoring biological agent sensors. Unsatisfied with the air samplers procured in 2003-2004, NYC wants brand-new, more sophisticated (and more expensive) biodetectors. The question is: are they really needed?
*"We'd like to see a little bit more focus in that area. . . . I think the federal government could do a better job," New York Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said in an interview this week. He was referring to New York City officials' desire for more detectors and enhanced capabilities under a federal government program known as BioWatch, under which air samplers were installed in 2003 in more than 30 major U.S. cities to detect the airborne release of biological warfare agents such as anthrax, plague and smallpox. *
*BioWatch was meant to speed up the response of health authorities in the critical hours before disease could spread and symptoms appeared in people. More than $400 million has been spent so far, but officials in New York and elsewhere say the older air samplers installed under the program do not work as well as intended. *
*The older samplers catch airborne particles in filters that are manually collected once a day and taken to a laboratory, requiring up to 30 hours to detect a pathogen. They may not preserve live organisms that scientists use to select treatment options. And the process is cost- and labor-intensive, leading to false alarms, quality-control problems and limits on the system's size, despite an $85 million-a-year national budget. *
New York officials say they prefer the newer model activated last month, known as Autonomous Pathogen Detection Systems and developed by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory with federal support. They can automatically sniff the air hourly for a week unattended, identify up to 100 harmful species by using two types of genetic and biochemical reaction tests, preserve live specimens and transmit results immediately to headquarters.
Of course they prefer the newer model. Who wouldn't trade in their Saturn for a bitchin' Camero? But it's not entirely clear that a hot rod is really required here.
You certainly don't need to identify up to 100 biological organisms when the CDC only identifies 56 on their watch list.
No one ought to start administering vaccines without a lab analysis confirming the detector's presumptive identification. And you don't need "live samples" when you have hospitals and clinics in the area.
This is an unnecessary and unaffordable program for homeland security purposes.
The DHS and cities, having bought into BioWatch, fell for the military's model for biological detection in 2003 -- largely because they didn't see anything else on the market. The Army needs to bring in mobile BW detectors into combat -- expensive detectors that take samples based on a short list of weaponized agents, and based on a threat that is right there during combat. Local emergency responders can't afford that model, and yet... they can't seem to think straight on the subject. They keep going to technicians and people who make their living by exaggerating bioterrorism risks for advice.
Fortunately, some policy experts are being heard.
*Some policy experts and members of Congress take an even more skeptical position, questioning the premises of the BioWatch program. Last month, for example, lawmakers set aside $2 million of BioWatch's $77 million operating budget for a "cost-benefit" analysis by the National Academy of Sciences of whether BioWatch's basic strategy -- of detecting the use of bioweapons through technology rather than through careful monitoring of disease patterns -- is flawed. *
The study is meant to examine whether it would be better to improve diagnostic tests at traditional medical facilities such as hospitals, expand electronic medical recordkeeping and upgrade data links that enable the government to monitor unusual health and agricultural sector disease patterns.
It's not too late, NYC officials. Turn back from the pretty beads and baubles and witchdoctors. You don't need expensive detectors and massive support contracts. You need medical surveillance programs and the occasional deployment of mobile detectors for special events. And just to give you a tip - you really want to check out how many successful systems the national labs have actually fielded out there.
Just saying...
New York City officials, are determined to set up a network of constantly-monitoring biological agent sensors. Unsatisfied with the air samplers procured in 2003-2004, NYC wants brand-new, more sophisticated (and more expensive) biodetectors. The question is: are they really needed?
