How old is the Plum Island facility, and what are the shortcomings there?
“The Plum Island facility itself is 54 years old. It’s aging in terms of its infrastructure. The other shortcoming is it doesn’t have a biosafety Level 4 facility. Capacity is an issue as well. One of the alternatives is building a new NBAF next to the existing facility.” There is a list on the DHS Web site of eight diseases to be studied by NBAF at the new location. Which one or two have the highest priority and why? “Foot and mouth is one of the eight. There are three very strong zoonotic diseases, which can go from animals to humans. Those are not currently studied on Plum Island. You really need a BSL4 (the biosafety level providing the highest level of containment protections) for those types of pathogens.” The new facility is expected to employ 250 to 350 people. Would most of those workers be moving from Plum Island, or do you expect to hire a lot of new people if the facility is moved? “We do expect some of those people to transfer but probably not all of them. Certainly, we wa
“The Plum Island facility itself is 54 years old. It’s aging in terms of its infrastructure. The other shortcoming is it doesn’t have a biosafety Level 4 facility. Capacity is an issue as well. One of the alternatives is building a new NBAF next to the existing facility.” There is a list on the DHS Web site of eight diseases to be studied by NBAF at the new location. Which one or two have the highest priority and why? “Foot and mouth is one of the eight. There are three very strong zoonotic diseases, which can go from animals to humans. Those are not currently studied on Plum Island. You really need a BSL4 (the biosafety level providing the highest level of containment protections) for those types of pathogens.” The new facility is expected to employ 250 to 350 people. Would most of those workers be moving from Plum Island, or do you expect to hire a lot of new people if the facility is moved? “We do expect some of those people to transfer but probably not all of them. Certainly, we wa
