CDC uses duct tape to seal off room with dangerous bacteria Cdc Government scientists are working with dangerous bacteria in a room where the containment door is sealed with duct tape, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.
The paper reports the tape was added to the door at the Center for Disease Control's new $214 million infectious disease lab last year after the ventilation system malfunctioned and pulled potentially contaminated air out of the lab and into an area designated as "clean," leading nine CDC workers to get tested for possible exposure to Q fever bacteria.
CDC officials tell the newspaper that the lab's air containment systems have been working properly since the incident, yet the paper reports the duct tape is still in place.
"It's an enhancement," CDC Safety and Occupational Health Manager Patrick Stockton tells the Journal-Constitution. "We could take it off."
Center officials told the paper the public was never at any risk. The paper reports designs have been completed for a new self-sealing door, which will be installed no later than April 2009.
The complex is supposed to host four maximum containment "Biosafety Level 4 labs" that will hold smallpox, Ebola and other lethal germs, but they have not yet been certified as safe to operate, the paper reports. It is the same building that the Journal-Constitution reported lost power for an hour last summer and back-up generators never turned on.
The Journal-Constitution says it requested safety records from the CDC a year ago, but the agency has not yet released the requested records.
An October 2007 Government Accountability Office report concluded the government does not know how many bioterror labs are in the United States, CQ Politics reports. Oversight of the labs can fall under more than a dozen federal agencies and no single agency bears the responsibility of tracking the labs.
(This posting was written by USA TODAY's Lisa Tanger.)
Posted by Mike Carney at 01:34 PM/ET, June 23, 2008 in Health/Science, Nation, Watchdog | Permalink
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