U.S. CDC labs close over concerns about air hose safety issues

(Reuters) – The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has closed down its highest security biosafety laboratories after discovering that hoses that supply air to scientists wearing special protective suits were never approved for that use, the agency said on Friday. “We have no evidence that anybody has suffered ill health effects from breathing air that came through these hoses,” Stephan Monroe, associate director for laboratory science and safety at the CDC, told Reuters. Monroe said he was confident scientists were not exposed to pathogens because the air they breathed passed through HEPA filters. The suits they wear also use positive air pressure to prevent pathogens from entering the suit. Monroe was named to the newly created position in 2015 in response to a months-long internal investigation into the mishandling of anthrax, bird flu and Ebola in CDC labs in 2014. CDC is now conducting safety tests to determine whether the scientists might have been exposed to harmful chemicals that passed through the air hoses. The problem stems from the original construction in 2005 of the Biosafety Level-4 laboratories, in which scientists handle the most dangerous biological agents. The air hoses are part of the building’s infrastructure. They drop down from different ports within the lab, and scientists plug the hoses into their suits from different work stations. About 100 former and current scientists have worked in one of the three labs since C...
Source: Mass Device - Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Tags: Sterilization / Calibration Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) Source Type: news