U.S. should expand rules for risky virus research to more pathogens, panel says

U.S. health officials should expand oversight of federally funded research that tweaks deadly viruses to include some less risky types of pathogens, an expert panel has concluded. Its draft report , released today, also recommends funding agencies share more information about decisions to approve such work. The recommendations are welcome news for scientists, lawmakers, and others who have worried the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has revealed gaps in the rules for so called gain-of-function (GOF) research. The report recommends “significant improvements in policy,” says Stanford University microbiologist David Relman, a critic of U.S. oversight of GOF studies, which are funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The group’s recommendations, from a working group of the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB), may also bring some relief to virologists who had worried the oversight would extend to common pathogens that rarely cause serious disease, such as cold viruses. But some experts say the proposed definition of risky research still leaves too much to interpretation and could sweep up routine studies important to public health. Concerns over GOF studies exploded 12 years ago when two researchers reported that they had tweaked H5N1 avian influenza in ways that made the virus spread more easily between ferrets, a model for human transmission. Although the work was meant to help prepare for pandemics, some experts worried such a...
Source: Science of Aging Knowledge Environment - Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research