Potential bioterrorist use of smallpox should put world on notice, experts say
Generally, the simulation uncovered that for a disease as infectious as smallpox, the most important determinants impacting the spread of the epidemic are finding and isolating people with smallpox, tracking their contacts and vaccinating them, and the speed of response, according to UNSW, where the simulation was held Aug. 16-17, 2018. It was funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Centre for Research Excellence, Integrated Systems for Epidemic Response (ISER), Emergent Biosolutions Inc., and Bavarian Nordic, with support from Global Security PLuS.
The resulting article published in Global Biosecurity, “Exercise Mataika: White Paper on response to a smallpox bioterrorism release in the Pacific,” is authored by numerous experts, including UNSW’s Raina MacIntyre, head of the university’s biosecurity program and a global biosecurity professor at its Kirby Institute; Kevin Yeo, director of clinical and medical affairs at Emergent BioSolutions; and Dr. J. Michael Lane, emeritus professor of preventive medicine at Emory University in Atlanta and a former special consultant to the WHO Smallpox Eradication Programme in Geneva, Switzerland, among several others. READ MORE