Biodefense for UW

For better or worse, the University of Washington faculty and the greater community are now vigorously engaged in a debate about whether the medical school should pursue a grant to build a lab to study how to prevent infectious diseases that could be used in terrorist attacks. It should.

Some questions to consider: Wouldn't it be a good idea to have experts in averting or curing such diseases close by? And where better to have such a lab? In 2003, the federal government designated the University of Washington the lead institution for one of eight Regional Centers of Excellence for Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases — the two nearest are in Galveston, Texas, and St. Louis, Mo.

Clearly a leader in such research, the UW received about $56 million last year from the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Disease.

That expertise explains the UW's logic in applying for what has become, at least initially, a controversial $25 million grant to help build a new Regional Biocontainment Laboratory near the medical center. Although the UW secured support from former Gov. Gary Locke, Mayor Greg Nickels and both of Washington's U.S. senators, some members of the faculty and community are disturbed they were not informed sooner.

UW officials insist their public disclosure was imminent. They are now meeting with faculty and community leaders. The grant application requires extensive public outreach and two public forums are planned in February.

Dr. Samuel Miller, director of the UW-based regional center, says the new lab would enhance current work already going on at the university through robotics and capacity to grow enough organisms to make vaccine. The proposed Level 3 lab would be the UW Medical Center's 30th with that designation and would research only diseases for which there is a known cure.

This is not a Level 4 Lab, which can research diseases with no known treatment, such as Ebola. The USA PATRIOT Act requires scrupulous inventory tracking and that lab users pass a Federal Bureau of Investigation background check.

The 56,000-square-foot lab would, however, be the UW's first free-standing Level 3 lab. The federal government would require it to be built with technologies causing it to withstand a car bomb. UW officials must satisfy the community the building would be at low risk for a terrorist attack. That's not such a far-fetched concern, considering the UW's Center for Urban Horticulture has reopened only this month, four years after it was firebombed by extremists.

After a rough start, the community conversation about the lab has started. It requires candor from UW officials as well as open-mindedness from the community about its potential benefits.