savebabe
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Member # 9847
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Virus, Security Worries Plum Island officials face a barrage over plans By Jennifer Landes
(8/7/2008) While the Montauk Monster fuels Internet conspiracy theories, inspired in part by intimations that the Plum Island Animal Disease Center may have spawned it, Southold residents cited more practical concerns Tuesday night.
At an informational meeting at Southold Town Hall, those who spoke worried about the environment, the shipment of virus and tissue samples, and the overall security of the research facility, which is just a mile off Orient Point.
Melanie Norden of Greenport came with a list of pathogens that she worried might be stored at Plum Island regardless of whether they were studied. ``It's extraordinarily misleading when you say this is what you study,'' as opposed to naming the diseases that might be stored there for other reasons.
As she read through a list that included anthrax, Lyme disease, West Nile virus, severe acute respiratory syndrome, known as SARS, tuberculosis, Rift Valley fever, and bird flu, Larry Barrett, the director of Plum Island, responded in the negative.
The only exceptions were African swine fever, classical swine fever, which is also known as hog cholera, and a bird flu not transferable to humans. The island also has samples of recombinant DNA -- strands of genetic material that have been manipulated or re-engineered into combinations not found in nature.
Officials from the facility said they were willing to address suggestions to improve its security. Suggestions included placing signs around Plum Island's perimeter to prevent boaters from getting too close, investigating why the Federal Aviation Administration does not recommend that a ``no fly zone'' be established over the island, and removing images of the island from Google Earth.
The officials also described how pathogen samples and tissue are wrapped and shipped to the island. Typically, the samples are driven from the three metropolitan area airports -- Newark, La Guardia, and Kennedy -- by couriers under contract to Plum Island. In emergencies, samples are flown in by helicopter.
The meeting was held in anticipation of the Department of Homeland Security's hearing next week in Greenport on the draft environmental study of Plum Island's suitability for a new National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility. As such, it would study the animal diseases that Plum Island now studies as well as new diseases transferable to humans.
The increased security and protection measures required for that kind of research would mandate that a new building and labs be constructed to contain the pathogens.
Five other sites -- in Texas, North Carolina, Kansas, Mississippi, and Georgia -- are being considered. Plum Island is in contention mostly because it is an existing site, the Department of Homeland Security has said. Department officials have been assuring Representative Tim Bishop and Senator Hillary Clinton that Plum Island is far down on the list, primarily because its remote location involves additional costs.
As to the Montauk Monster, even the most suspicious examiners in the room did not appear to think it was worth mentioning.
Jerry Callis, a former director of Plum Island, said in response to the national obsession with the mystery animal, ``So they're trying to connect that to Plum Island? Sounds like a good story.''
Posts: 1603 | From ny | Registered: Aug 2006
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Geneal
Frequent Contributor (5K+ posts)
Member # 10375
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I can identify.
We have a primate research center about 15 miles from my house.
NIH funds them.
Top thing they study is HIV (sure....).
Second is Lyme disease.
They do bio-weapon research as well.
Sure I trust them to keep it all contained.
Nothing like being a human guinea pig without volunteering to take part in the study.
Hugs,
Geneal
Posts: 6250 | From Louisiana | Registered: Oct 2006
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Nothing like being a human guinea pig without volunteering to take part in the study.
Hugs,
Geneal
They deny that -- despite Plum Island situated only 10 miles south of Lyme, CT where Lyme originated and where there is the highest risk of Lyme-- that they don't study Lyme or test the public unbeknownst to them, but they admit they are now studying it in their new biolab in Colorado?
Nothing like being a human guinea pig without volunteering to take part in the study.
Hugs,
Geneal
In an article, ``Pentagon Bioweapons: Crimes Against Humanity, William Bowles writes, ``Boyle's short and impassioned book deals with the US government's illegal multi-billion dollar biological weapons programme. A program that as Boyle makes abundantly clear presents itself as "defensive" but of course, in order to produce a 'defense', requires the development of offensive bioweapons.
In fact, the penalties involved for engaging in even the research into biological weapons under US domestic law are life imprisonment and under certain circumstances, even the death penalty as well as impeachment for the president (followed rapidly one hopes by life imprisonment).
But not only does it deal with the illegal bioweapons programme initiated under the Reagan government, continued under Clinton and vastly expanded under the current regime, it reveals the linkage between the anthrax attack on Congress and 9-11;'' See: http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=8&contentid=3280
Yet, did you know that the government has the legal right to experiment on the military according the Ferres doctrine?
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