The impending closure of the FBI's investigation of the anthrax-laced mailings of 2001 has generated new interest in the question: Are we safer today than we were when anthrax was distributed up and down the Eastern seaboard, killing five people and sickening 17 others? Unfortunately, the answer is probably no - despite our government's best efforts to prevent a future bioterrorist incident.
Bioterrorism is like no other national security threat. What makes defending against it so challenging is the blurred line between beneficial research and destructive intent. For example, some of the same knowledge and equipment used to generate new lifesaving drugs could also inflict mass casualties in the hands of bioterrorists. As globalization spreads these biotechnologies around the world in support of improved public health, potentially dangerous knowledge is being placed in the hands of more individuals in more countries than ever before.
The problem can be domestic, as illustrated by the 2001 anthrax attacks, which the FBI says were launched by Bruce E. Ivins, a researcher at Fort Detrick in Frederick. Since 2001, 11 U.S. government agencies have spent upward of $50 billion to meet the threat of biological weapons. This has resulted in the rapid growth in the number of research organizations - public and private - that are handling dangerous biological agents. The inability of the military's secure facility to prevent dispersion of anthrax highlights the practical complications of monitoring minute but deadly quantities of pathogens and toxins.
