Front and Center: Security at Boston's Infectious Disease Research Lab

When controversy hit, Kevin Tuohey became the public face of a high-profile plan to study deadly diseases in Boston. To succeed, the security director would have to become part diplomat, part great communicator.

By Scott Berinato

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A month after ACE and the scientists sent their letter, two lab researchers counting bacteria colonies would unknowingly inhale live strains of F. tularensis and contract rabbit fever.

A Bad Report Card

The four-month investigation by the Boston Public Health Commission that followed the rabbit fever outbreak resulted in a

14-page report in March 2005. It said BU Medical Center was far from blameless. "Researchers noted the lack of use of personal protective equipment when counting [bacteria] colonies on an open bench," it said. And "despite stringent guidelines on receipt and storage of Select Agents, [BU] did not have a system of laboratory testing in place to verify that the organisms being used in research were those that had been requested."

Practices and safety measures in the Biosafety Level 2 lab were "inadequate" to prevent infection. BU should have reported the cases earlier and "should have had stronger procedures in place to monitor laboratory personnel," which may have prevented the third case of rabbit fever. The tularemia lab "failed to consistently utilize adequate precautions when handling and manipulating laboratory specimens." And finally: "The BU Institutional Biosafety Committee was not able to ensure compliance with appropriate laboratory protocols and procedures."

Opponents of the NEIDL took the momentum. They ticked off a litany of recent failures across the country with infectious agents, at labs and in the mail, culminating in the rabbit fever case. The opponents' new talking point was something like, If it can happen with tularemia, it can happen with anthrax. They filed a federal lawsuit (still pending) against the NIH to stop the project.

It didn't matter that the report also said that the rabbit fever cases posed no threat of infection to the community, or that a University of Nebraska lab errantly delivered Biosafety Level 3 live strains of F. tularensis instead of inert Biosafety Level 2 bacteria, or that, even if it was slow to connect the dots, BU Medical Center reported the cases days after it had connected them.

Tuohey called the assault on BU's credibility unfair. He countered, partly by acknowledging the failures and communicating what's being done about them. "What happened wouldn't have happened in a Biosafety Level 3 or Biosafety Level 4 because of safety features in those kinds of labs," which are more stringent than in the lab where this occurred, he says.

But, he adds, "it's a controls issue. A procurement issue. A very important lesson about what comes in the mail, and trust. We've applied new controls across campus. We test every agent that comes in to make sure it is what it says it is. We have unannounced inspections," and third parties look at lab procedures.