Electron micrograph of avian influenzaCDC
In the wake of news last month that researchers had created a version of the deadly bird flu that was easily transmissible by air, a heated debate has arisen in the scientific community about whether or not the research should be published. But some experts are taking the discussion a step further back, and wondering why the research was conducted at all.
“Why should our tax dollars be used to create new pandemic pathogens?” said Richard Ebright, a chemical biologist at Rutgers University.
The bird flu breakthrough came from two separate groups, one at Erasmus University in the Netherlands and another at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who successfully converted H5N1 into a form that can be transmitted between ferrets in droplets through the air. ...
