BU biolab training exercises set to begin
By Stephen Smith (From The Boston Globe), June 24, 2009
The controversial Boston University research laboratory built to study the world’s deadliest germs will open its doors to scientists in a few months for training exercises, the university announced this afternoon.
When the researchers enter the South End facility late in the summer or early in the fall, they will not use any bacteria or viruses. Instead, university officials said, the exercises are being conducted to “test safety, health, and operational procedures.” Later, emergency response teams — including police officers and firefighters — will engage in emergency response drills. The exercises are expected to last six to eight months.
The drills represent another milestone in BU’s six-year-long quest to open its National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories, which has encountered sustained opposition from neighborhood activists in the South End and Roxbury. Lab opponents sued in state and federal court to halt the facility, and while judges allowed construction to continue, they ordered further environmental reviews.
In April, the federal agency underwriting construction of the lab told a federal judge that the latest environmental review will take a year longer than projected. The National Institutes of Health estimated that it would not be able to submit the safety analysis to US District Court Judge Patti B. Saris until spring or summer of next year. Saris, overseeing a lawsuit filed by residents, then will spend several months more evaluating the findings. If she backs the lab, preparations necessary for scientists to work with deadly agents would take additional time.
For now, the $192 million building is complete but vacant on Albany Street. The centerpiece of the project — originally expected to begin welcoming scientists in late 2007 or early 2008 — is a Biosafety Level-4 lab designed to let researchers hunt for vaccines and drugs targeted at the highly lethal germs that cause such diseases as Ebola, Marburg, and plague.