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bioterrorism

(bī'ō-tĕr'ə-rĭz'əm) pronunciation

The use of biological agents, such as pathogenic organisms or agricultural pests, for terrorist purposes.

bioterrorist bi'o·ter'ror·ist adj. & n.

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US History Encyclopedia: Bioterrorism

Bioterrorism, the deliberate, private use of biological agents to harm and frighten the people of a state or society, is related to the military use of biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons. Formally the use of such weapons by one state to threaten or attack another state is warfare, although such warfare may violate the laws of war, and any use of such weapons by private individuals is terrorism.

The use of biological weapons for terror is ancient. Assyrian politicians (c. 650 B.C.) dumped fungus from rye into their opponents' wells, giving them fatal ergot poisoning. Armies besieging a town relied on increased disease among the defending populace and threw dead animals into water supplies to encourage it. Fourteenth-century Tatars spread bubonic plague by catapulting diseased corpses into towns.

With the advent of the germ theory of disease, greater knowledge of microbiology, and military bioengineering, the potential devastation due to biological weapons grew exponentially. In 1876, the German biologist Robert Koch first proved that anthrax is caused by bacteria. In World War I (1914–1918), biological weapons developed by the United States and Germany were perhaps used to contaminate animal fodder, and the Germans used Burkholderia mallei to cause glanders in enemy support animals. During World War II renewed concern over "germ warfare" fueled both sides' research regarding biological weapons, but there is no record of their being used. The height of the development of "weaponized" biological agents was the Cold War (1946–1991), in which both the United States and the Soviet Union created arsenals of biological agents for use both in battle and against civilian populations. This research led to propagandist charges of using such weapons; during the Korean War (1950–1953), North Korea accused the United States of dropping bombs containing diseased flies. Since the 1975 ratification of the Biological Weapons Convention, the United States, Russia, and most states have publicly claimed that they have destroyed their stockpiles and now research biological warfare only to defend against it. Even so, during the Persian Gulf War of 1991, Iraq equipped, but did not fire, rocket warheads containing anthrax.

The danger of the use of biological weapons by terrorists has grown as knowledge of such weapons and the military technology for them has become more widely available following the end of the Cold War. Acts of bioterrorism have increased in frequency and severity since then. In 1984, the pseudo-Buddhist Rajneeshee cult distributed salmonella in restaurants and a grocery store in The Dalles, Oregon, attempting to poison civic leaders to gain control of local government; 751 people developed gastroenteritis. Aum Shinrikyo, a Japanese cult, killed twelve people and injured thousands in the Tokyo subway through a sarin gas attack in 1995 and has made further, but unsuccessful, attempts to release airborne biological agents in the subways.

In 2001, letters containing anthrax spores were mailed to television news anchor Tom Brokaw, U.S. Senator Tom Daschle, and others, leading to the deaths of five people and the hospitalization of at least twelve others, although the targeted individuals were unhurt. The attacks coincided with the attacks by the Islamic terrorist group Al Qaeda on New York City and Washington, D.C., although at this writing their perpetrator remains unknown.

Bibliography

Falkenrath, Richard A., Robert D. Newman, and Bradley A. Thayer. America's Achilles' Heel: Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Terrorism and Covert Attack. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1998.

Laqueur, Walter. The New Terrorism: Fanaticism and the Arms of Mass Destruction. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Miller, Judith, Stephen Engelberg, and William J. Broad. Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001.

Zilinskas, Raymond A. "Rethinking Bioterrorism." Current History 100 (2001): 438–443.

—Stephen M. Sheppard

Intelligence Encyclopedia: Bioterrorism

Bioterrorism is the use of a biological weapon against a civilian or military population by a government, organization, or individual. As with any form of terrorism, its purposes include the undermining of morale, creating chaos, or achieving political goals. Biological weapons use microorganisms and toxins to produce disease and death in humans, livestock, and crops.

Bioterrorism is viewed as a serious threat to national security. For example, disaster scenarios created by United States government agencies predict that the release of a few hundred pounds of the spores of Bacillus anthracis (the bacterium that cause the disease called anthrax) upwind of Washington, D.C., could sicken or kill hundreds of thousands to millions of people within twenty-four hours.

Bioterrorism can also be used as a weapon to damage or destroy the economy of the target nation. A report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates the costs of dealing with a large-scale anthrax incident is at least $26 billion per 100,000 people. Only a few such incidents could cripple the economy of any nation. Indeed, the few anthrax incidents in the last few months of 2001 cost the United States government hundreds of millions of dollars in treatment, investigation, and other response measures.

Biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons can all be used to achieve similar destructive goals (i.e., massive loss of life). In comparison, biological weapons are inexpensive to make, relative to chemical and nuclear weapons. A sophisticated biological production facility can be set up in a warehouse, or even in a building as small as a house. Biological weapons are relatively easy to transport and resist detection by standard security systems.

In general, chemical weapons act immediately, causing illness in minutes. For example, the release of sarin gas in the Tokyo subway in 1995 by the religious sect Aum Shinrikyo almost immediately killed 12 and hospitalized 5,000 people. In contrast, the illness and death from biological weapons can occur more slowly, with evidence of exposure and illness appearing over time. Thus, a bioterrorist attack may at first be indistinguishable from a natural outbreak of an infectious disease. By the time the deliberate nature of the attack is realized, the health care system may be unable to cope with the large number of victims.

The deliberate production and stockpiling of biological weapons is prohibited by the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. The United States ceased offensive production of biological weapons in 1969, on orders from then President Richard Nixon. The U.S. stockpiles were destroyed in 1971–1972. This measure has not stopped bioterrorists from acquiring the materials and expertize needed to produce biological weapons.

Genetic engineering can produce a wide variety of bioweapons including bacteria or viruses that produce toxins. More conventional laboratory technologies can also produce bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics.

Examples of the most likely to be used bioterrorist weapons include smallpox (caused by the Variola virus), anthrax (caused by Bacillus anthracis), and plague (caused by Yersinia pestis).

The last recorded case of smallpox was in Somalia in 1977. As of 2002, only two facilities—one in the United States and one in Russia—are authorized to store the virus. In spite of international prohibitions, security experts suspect that smallpox viruses may be under development as biological weapons in other laboratories of many nations. As recently as 1992, Russia had the ability to launch missiles containing weapons-grade smallpox. A number of terrorist organizations including Al Qaeda have explored the use of biological weapons.

Bioterrorism may ultimately prove to be more destructive than conventional warfare, because of the mobility of the weapons and their ability to spread infection through an entire population. An epidemic can spread a disease far from the point of origin of the illness.

Preparing a strategy to defend against biological warfare is challenging. Traditional identification of microorganisms such as bacteria and viruses relies on assays that detect growth of the microbes. Newer technologies detect microbes based on sequences of genetic material. The genetic technologies can detect microbes in minutes. As of 2002, however, the genetic technologies are not available to any but the most sophisticated field investigative units.

Researchers are also working to counter bioterrorist attacks using several other new technological strategies. For example, robots equipped with sensors or microchipmechanized insects (with computerized circuitry that can mimic biological processes such as neural networks) are being developed. Bees, beetles, and other insects outfitted with sensors are used to collect real-time information about the presence of toxins or similar threats. These new technologies could be used to examine a suspected biological weapon and spare exposing investigators to potential hazards. The robotics program of the Defense Advanced Research Project (DARPA) works to rapidly identify bio-responses to pathogens, and for designs to effectively and rapidly treat them.

Research is also underway to find genetic similarities between the microbes that could be used by bioterrorists. A vaccine made of a protein that is common to several bacteria could potentially offer protection to the exposure any bacterium in the group, for example.

Definition

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) 1:

A bioterrorism attack is the deliberate release of viruses, bacteria, or other germs (agents) used to cause illness or death in people, animals, or plants. These agents are typically found in nature, but it is possible that they could be changed to increase their ability to cause disease, make them resistant to current medicines, or to increase their ability to be spread into the environment. Biological agents can be spread through the air, through water, or in food. Terrorists may use biological agents because they can be extremely difficult to detect and do not cause illness for several hours to several days. Some bioterrorism agents, like the smallpox virus, can be spread from person to person and some, like anthrax, can not.

Types of biological agents

The CDC has defined and categorized bioterrorism agents according to priority 2 as follows:

Category A agents

These are biological agents with both a high potential for adverse public health impact and that also have a serious potential for large-scale dissemination. The Category A agents are anthrax, smallpox, plague, botulism, tularemia, and viral hemorrhagic fevers.

Anthrax: Anthrax is a non-contagious disease. An anthrax vaccine does exist but requires many injections and has side effects that render it unsuitable for general use.

Smallpox: Smallpox is a highly contagious virus. It transmits easily through the atmosphere and has a high mortality rate (20-40%). Smallpox was eliminated in the world in the 1970s, thanks to a worldwide vaccination program. However, some virus samples are still available in Russian and American laboratories. Some believe that after the collapse of the Soviet Union, cultures of smallpox have become available in other countries. Although people born pre-1970 will have been vaccinated for smallpox under the WHO program, the effectiveness of vaccination is limited since the vaccine provides high level of immunity for only 3 to 5 years. As a biological weapon smallpox is dangerous because of the highly contagious nature of both the infected and their pox. Smallpox occurs only in humans, and has no external hosts or vectors.

Botulinum toxin: Botulinum toxin is one of the deadliest toxins known, and is produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum. Botulism causes death by respiratory failure and paralysis. It is also easy to obtain since it is found in the cosmetic products Botox and Dysport.

Ebola: Ebola is a viral hemorrhagic fever, with fatality rates ranging from 50-90%. No cure currently exists, although vaccines are in development. The United States and the erstwhile Soviet Union both investigated the use of ebola for biological warfare, and the Aum Shinrikyo group possessed cultures of the virus. Ebola kills its victims through multiple organ failure and hypovolemic shock.

Plague: Plague is a disease caused by the Yersinia pestis bacterium. Rodents are the normal host of plague, and the disease is transmitted to humans by flea bites and occasionally by aerosol in the form of pneumonic plague. The disease has a history of use in biological warfare dating back many centuries, and is considered a threat due to its ease of culture and ability to remain in circulation among local rodents for a long period of time.

Marburg: Marburg is a viral hemorrhagic fever virus first discovered in Marburg, Germany. Fatality rates range from 25-100%, and although a vaccine is in development, no treatments currently exist aside from supportive care. As with ebola, basic barrier nursing significantly reduces the virulence of the virus.

Tularemia: Tularemia, or rabbit fever, is a generally non-lethal and severely incapacitating disease caused by the Francisella tularensis bacterium. It has been widely produced for biological warfare due to its highly infective nature, and ease of aerosolization.

Category B agents

Category B agents are moderately easy to disseminate and have low mortality rates.

Brucellosis (Brucella species) Brucellosis is an infectious disease caused by the bacteria of the genus Brucella. These bacteria are primarily passed among animals, and they cause disease in many different vertebrates. Various Brucella species affect sheep, goats, cattle, deer, elk, pigs, dogs, and several other animals. Humans become infected by coming in contact with animals or animal products that are contaminated with these bacteria. In humans brucellosis can cause a range of symptoms that are similar to the flu and may include fever, sweats, headaches, back pains, and physical weakness. Severe infections of the central nervous systems or lining of the heart may occur. Brucellosis can also cause long-lasting or chronic symptoms that include recurrent fevers, joint pain, and fatigue
Epsilon toxin of Clostridium perfringens
Food safety threats (e.g., Salmonella species, E coli O157:H7, Shigella, Stash)
Glanders (Burkholderia mallei)
Melioidosis (Burkholderia pseudomallei)
Psittacosis (Chlamydia psittaci)
Q fever (Coxiella burnetii)
Ricin toxin from Ricinus communis (castor beans)
Staphylococcal enterotoxin B
Typhus (Rickettsia prowazekii)
Viral encephalitis (alphaviruses, e.g.: Venezuelan equine encephalitis, eastern equine encephalitis, western equine encephalitis)
Water supply threats (e.g., Vibrio cholerae, Cryptosporidium parvum, Cholera )

Category C agents

Category C agents are pathogens that might be engineered for mass dissemination because they are easy to produce and have potential for high morbidity or mortality (examples: nipah virus, hantavirus and multi-drug resistant Tuberculosis (MTB).

Modern bioterrorist incidents

1915-16 livestock sabotage by Germany

Dr Anton Dilger, a German-American physician, worked for Germany in the U.S. (Chevy Chase and Baltimore) in 1915 and 1916 with cultures of anthrax and glanders with the intention of biological sabotage on behalf of the German government. Other German agents are known to have undertaken similar sabotage efforts during WWI in Norway, Spain, Romania and Argentina.

1984 Rajneeshee Salmonella attack

In 1984, followers of the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh attempted to control a local election by incapacitating the local population by infecting salad bars in eleven restaurants, doorknobs, produce in grocery stores and other public domains with Salmonella typhimurium in the city of The Dalles, Oregon. The attack caused about 751 people to get sick (no fatalities). This incident was the first known bioterrorist attack in the United States in the 20th century.

2001 anthrax attack

In September and October of 2001, several cases of anthrax broke out in the United States in the 2001 anthrax attacks, caused deliberately. This was a well-publicized act of bioterrorism. It motivated efforts to define biodefense and biosecurity, where more limited definitions of biosafety had focused on unintentional or accidental impacts of agricultural and medical technologies.

2003 ricin incidents

See also: Ricin

Planning for and reacting to a bioterrorist attack

Planning may involve the development of biological identification systems.

Until recently in the United States of America, most biological defense strategies have been geared to protecting soldiers on the battlefield rather than ordinary people in cities. Financial cutbacks have limited the tracking of disease outbreaks. Some outbreaks, such as food poisoning due to E. coli or Salmonella, could be of either natural or deliberate origin.

Biosurveillance strategies

In 1999, the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Biomedical Informatics deployed the first automated bioterrorism detection system, called RODS (Real-Time Outbreak Disease Surveillance). RODS is designed to draw collect data from many data sources and use them to perform signal detection, that is, to detect the a possible bioterrorism event at the earliest possible moment. RODS, another systems like it, collect data from sources including clinic data, laboratory data, and data from over-the-counter drug sales. In 2000, Michael Wagner, the codirector of the RODS laboratory, and Ron Aryel, a subcontractor, conceived of the idea of obtaining live data feeds from "non-traditional" (non-health-care) data sources. The RODS laboratory's first efforts eventually led to the establishment of the National Retail Data Monitor, a system which collects data from 20,000 retail locations nation-wide.

On February 5, 2002, President Bush visited the RODS laboratory and used it as a model for a $300 million spending proposal to equip all 50 states with biosurveillance systems. In a speech delivered at the nearby Masonic temple, Bush compared the RODS system to a modern "DEW" line (referring to the Cold War ballistic missile early warning system).

The principles and practices of biosurveillance, a new interdisciplinary science, were defined and described in HANDBOOK OF BIOSURVEILLANCE, edited by Michael Wagner, Andrew Moore and Ron Aryel, and published in 2006 by Elsevier's Academic Press division. Biosurveillance is the science of real-time disease outbreak detection. Its principles apply to both natural and man-made epidemics (bioterrorism).

Data which potentially could assist in early detection of a bioterrorism event include many categories of information. Health-related data such as that from hospital computer systems, clinical laboratories, electronic health record systems, medical examiner record-keeping systems, 911 call center computers, and veterinary medical record systems could be of help; researchers are also considering the utility of data generated by ranching and feedlot operations, food processors, drinking water systems, school attendance recording, and physiologic monitors, among others. Intuitively, one would expect systems which collect more than one type of data to be more useful than systems which collect only one type of information (such as single-purpose laboratory or 911 call-center based systems), and be less prone to false alarms, and this appears to be the case.

In Europe, disease surveillance is beginning to be organized on the continent-wide scale needed to track a biological emergency. The system not only monitors infected persons, but attempts to discern the origin of the outbreak.

Researchers are experimenting with devices to detect the existence of a threat:

tiny electronic chips that would contain living nerve cells to warn of the presence of bacterial toxins (identification of broad range toxins)
fiber-optic tubes lined with antibodies coupled to light-emitting molecules (identification of specific pathogens, such as anthrax, botulinum, ricin)

Limitations of bioterrorism

Bioterrorism is inherently limited as a warfare tactic because of the uncontrollable nature of the agent involved. A biological weapon is useful to a terrorist group mainly as a method of creating mass panic and disruption to a society. However, technologists such as Bill Joy have warned of the potential power which genetic engineering might place in the hands of future bio-terrorists^[1]; a bacterial agent might be engineered for genetic or geographical selectivity. Such a scenario formed the plot of the science fiction novel The White Plague and the action novel Area 7.

Other forms of bioterrorism

The use of agents that do not cause harm to humans but disrupt the economy have been discussed.^{[citation needed]} A highly relevant pathogen in this context is the foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) virus, which is capable of causing widespread economic damage and public concern (as witnessed in the 2001 and 2007 FMD outbreaks in the UK), whilst having almost no capacity to infect humans.

The genomic revolution requires scientists to follow a recognised Code of Conduct. The 'dual-use' technology dilemma implicates issues further; good scientific inventions can be reapplied along a sinister vector.

References

^ Why the future doesn't need us

External links

EU Health Portal Information on EU activities related to bioterrorism
Green Goo - Life In The Era Of Humane Genocide by Nick Szabo
Project BioShield Has Given Biotechs Little Motivation to Protect Americans - BioHealth Investor.com (Sunday, January 14, 2007)
The CDC's Emergency Preparedness & Response (Bioterrorism) Website
Fighting Fear of a Bioterrorism Event With Information Technology: Real-World Examples and Opportunities
USAMRIID’s Medical Management of Biological Casualties Handbook
The Sunshine Project: Protection or Proliferation? Map and Publications on the US Biodefense Program
"Biotech and bioterror: a global dilemma" -- article based on congressional testimony
Bioterrorism Category A Agents - Information Resources
Bioterrorism News from Genome News Network (GNN)
NOVA: Bioterror
Revisiting the 1984 Rajneeshee Bioterror Attack in The Dalles, Oregon
Handbook of Biosurveilance
RODS Laboratory
National Retail Data Monitor

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		Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Read more
		US History Encyclopedia. © 2006 through a partnership of Answers Corporation. All rights reserved. Read more
		Intelligence Encyclopedia. Encyclopedia of Espionage, Intelligence, and Security. Copyright © 2004 by The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved. Read more
		Bioterrorism Dictionary. Copyright © 2002 yourDictionary.com. All rights reserved. Read more
		Politics. The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Edited by E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Joseph F. Kett, and James Trefil. Copyright © 2002 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin. All rights reserved. Read more
		Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Bioterrorism". Read more

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