The National Institute of Health will release a draft risk assessment on Boston University’s Biosafety Level-4 laboratory and hold meetings in Boston in the coming weeks for locals to voice comments and concerns about the document, university officials said.
Ellen Berlin, the BU spokeswoman for the biosafety lab, said the meeting date is not set yet, but should be announced soon.
Plans for public tours are being finalized at the Boston University Medical Campus National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories, based in Roxbury. Boston Mayor Thomas Menino led a private tour of the building on Jan. 11.
“BU has begun conducting NEIDL tours for neighborhood groups and other interested parties and will continue to do so over the next few months,” Berlin said.
The Jan. 11 tour highlighted both the safety features of the lab and the prospective economic impact that the facility will have on the city.
A report published in the Boston Business Journal said the lab is expected to reap more than $98 million in profits for the city.
The Journal said once the lab is fully operational it will create 297 new jobs. Thirty to 40 of these jobs have been filled already. BU officials, however, are looking for more research teams to work in the level-2 lab, the Journal reported.
The Roxbury job market is projected to benefit from the lab. An estimated 380 additional jobs in markets such as retail and construction will be created once the lab is running.
Workers will likely have to deal with a strict safety protocol, which includes wearing $2,600 space suits, breathing filtered air and taking chemical showers in the suit before leaving specific rooms within the lab.
In terms of community safety, the lab has a negative air flow system that will carry airborne hazards back into specific rooms within the lab instead of out into hallways.
General safety is just as strenuous as biohazard safety. Hundreds of security cameras are located throughout the building, and workers will undergo background checks. Stairwells are off limits and floors are guarded by eye-scanners that will identify individual workers.
The lab received approval in early December to conduct lower-level research on diseases such as tuberculosis, according to an article published in The Daily Free Press on Dec. 5. Researchers are expected to begin work in the next few months.
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