Editorial: Tracking deadly cargo

Saturday, Oct. 6, 2007 | 1:39 a.m.

A new federal report says U.S. anti-terrorism agencies don't know how many of the nation's research laboratories handle hazardous toxins and germs. The agencies are not adequately tracking accidents, losses of dangerous substances or the potential for terrorist attacks at these labs.

The Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, prepared the report for a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing conducted Thursday.

According to the GAO, the federal government regulates 409 laboratories that work with some of the world's deadliest toxins and organisms, including anthrax and the bacteria or viruses that cause plague, tuberculosis, typhoid fever and several strains of flu.

The GAO's review of 12 U.S. anti-terrorism agencies revealed that none is responsible for assessing the risk of terrorist attacks on these facilities, and the agencies have trouble keeping track of where all these facilities are.

U.S. intelligence officials told the GAO that adequate oversight of the laboratories' work is hindered by regulation failures in countries that ship toxic substances to the United States. More than 100 accidents and missing shipments involving deadly toxins have been reported since 2003, an Associated Press story said this week.

In one instance, the GAO reports, inspectors from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which inspects labs once every three years, visited a Texas A&M University research laboratory less than two weeks after a worker there had been accidentally exposed to dangerous bacteria and later fell seriously ill.

But no one told the CDC inspectors.

In fact, the GAO says, contrary to law, the laboratories have failed to report accidents with hazardous biological substances.

It is astonishing that dozens - maybe hundreds - of U.S. laboratories are working with deadly toxins such as anthrax or bird flu virus without adequate oversight or protection. It is equally unnerving that government regulators have been unaware that shipments of biohazards have gone missing, in some cases, for years. The federal government simply must do a better job of overseeing these laboratories and the deadly substances with which they work.