Debate over the safety of Boston University’s Biosafety Level-4 laboratory was reignited Wednesday night at a meeting concerning the risk assessment associated with the biolab.
The National Institutes of Health Blue Ribbon Panel for the Risk Assessment of the biolab held a hearing at the Marriot Copley Plaza Hotel to discuss with an audience of about 200 about the current status of the risk assessment of the laboratory to be completed by Tetra Tech, a firm that specializes in such studies.
Panel members said they hope to produce a credible risk assessment that will be trusted by the community.
For the first hour of the hearing, the committee recapped the past meetings and hearings since 2003 concerning disputes over the BU biolab.
“The [National Research Committee] recommended that the risk assessments examine a range of possible outcomes for the scenarios given the transmission and characteristics of the agents in question,” said Ahmed Mahmoud, the NIH Blue Ribbon Panel main speaker for the evening.
“By the end of this evening we aim to ensure that you are fully informed about the status of the risk assessment, to offer an opportunity to dialogue on the study,” Mahmoud said.
Panelist Samuel Stanley said that each disease housed in the biolab is a public health concern and that they must be worked on under highly contained conditions.
“With the recommendations from the NRC, as well as the courts in the state of Massachusetts, as well as public comments, we recommended thirteen agents for further risk assessment studies,” Stanley said.
Early on in the meeting, attendee David Mundel requested from the panel a more accurate assessment of the risks of the biolab to the community.
Klare Allen, an anti-biolab activist, argued that if the panel really cared about the community, they would not have put the hearing in one of the richest neighborhoods in Boston and in an area inaccessible to many of the Roxbury residents who live near the biolab.
“This is a community meeting that is not in our community,” Allen said.
Mahmoud tried to explain the reasons behind the Copley Square location.
“We had difficulty with the previous hall because of people who were prevented to get into the room in Roxbury,” Mahmoud said.
Michael Kurrilla, who directs the Office of Biodefense Research Affairs at National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease and who was in the audience, said that the community seemed more interested in the goals of the committee than they have in the past, instead of straying from the main discussion.
“There was much more of an interaction back and forth than what we’ve seen in the past,” he said. “There seemed to be specific engagement with aspects of the risk assessment.”
During the discussion, BU’s ownership and power over the agents studied at the lab came into question. Although many attendees argued that BU would not have power for another 20 years concerning the use of the lab, Kurilla said that it would be BU’s prerogative to use the building for whatever research it desired to pursue.
“BU decides what they want to work on within the confines of the priorities pathogens A, B and C, and then submits their views and concepts,” Kurilla said. “No one is telling them what to do. The government is not telling them what to do. . . . Other scientific experts review their proposals and decide if BU will receive funding.”
Lou Abbey, an attendee from Revere, spoke on public panic in an evacuation situation and how it should be integrated into the risk assessment analysis.
“The panel is like a little island in the process and what they said about the fact that they don’t have any specific say about the go ahead or the cancellation of this project. They are information,” Abbey said. “They are bringing [risk assessment] to a community, which maybe doesn’t have any interest in risk assessment. They just don’t want the lab.”
“I think that this is a really important step in the process and if they are allowed to do their job it could be the make or the break of the thing,” he said. “But [the panel] cannot make conclusions on information that they don’t have yet.”
Mundel said there has been progress made in getting the views of the community heard and producing an effective risk assessment plan.
“As it evolved, it became clear that people were listening and responding. There was a great deal of tension in the beginning because we have a history of not being listened to,” Mundel said. “We’ve made tremendous progress and we have more of a chance of getting the assessment done correctly than we’ve had before, by a substantial amount.”
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