The Risk of Lab-Created, Potentially Pandemic Pathogens

In 2012, the research work of Ron Fouchier and Yoshihiro Kawaoka “renewed the debate over whether potential pandemic virus research is too dangerous to conduct.” These researchers published “studies on making avian influenza contagious through the air among mammals.” At the time of publication, highly pathogenic avian influenza, or H5N1, was already known to transmit human-to-human, if only rarely.

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