Ferreting out the truth on Science Sunday Hangout on Air
I joined Buddhini Samarasinghe, Scott Lewis, Tommy Leung, and William McEwan for a discussion of the avian influenza H5N1 virus transmission experiments done in ferrets.
aerosol transmission
Influenza H5N1 x H1N1 reassortants: ignore the headlines, it’s good science
Those of you with an interest in virology, or perhaps simply sensationalism, have probably seen the recent headlines proclaiming another laboratory-made killer influenza virus. From The Independent: ‘Appalling irresponsibility: Senior scientists attack Chinese researchers for creating new strains of influenza virus’; and from InSing.com: ‘Made-in-China killer flu virus’. It’s unfortunate that the comments of several …
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Harvard University: Great virology, bad science writing
Harvard University is home to some of the world’s finest virologists. But apparently they do not communicate with the writers at Harvard Magazine, where a botched story on the avian H5N1 influenza virus has just been published. The problems begin with the first paragraph: But when Dutch researchers recently created an even more deadly strain …
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The risks and benefits of influenza H5N1 research
Both Nature and the New York Times have weighed in on the resumption of influenza H5N1 research. In an editorial from 23 January 2013, Nature opines that “Experiments that make deadly pathogens more dangerous demand the utmost scrutiny”: As several critics point out, the assessments of the relative risks and benefits of such research remain …
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Kawaoka paper published on aerosol transmission of H5 influenza virus in ferrets
One of two papers on avian influenza H5N1 virus that caused such a furor in the past six months was published today in the journal Nature. I have read it, and I can assure you that the results do not enable the construction of a deadly biological weapon. Instead, they illuminate important requirements for the …
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