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Laboratories destroying deadly flu virus

Emergency Management Alert, April 19, 2005

Laboratories around the globe are destroying samples of a deadly strain of flu virus after a life science company distributed samples of it to nearly 4,000 facilities between September 2004 and March 2005, Reuters reports.

Meridian Bioscience, which is located in Cincinnati, sent out the virus H2N2 so that laboratories could test their ability to detect strains.

The World Health Organization (WHO) does not consider H2N2 - which killed between 1 million and 4 million people in 1957 - a serious threat. However, no one born after 1968 has any immunity to it.

"It is a risk, but it is considered low," says senior WHO scientist Klaus Stohr, MD.

Considering the strain's deadly history, Stohr says "it was an unwise decision to send it out."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is currently investigating Meridian Bioscience.

It is unclear why the company used H2N2 in proficiency panels. CDC Director Julie Gerberding, MD, says it is hard to believe Meridian Bioscience did not understand the toxicity of H2N2.

Most of the 4,000 labs were located in the United States. But H2N2 was also sent to Canada, Saudi Arabia, Jamaica, Mexico, Lebanon, Brazil, Hong Kong, and Italy.

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