Bioterrorism
This essay basically examines the topic of bioterrorism in the light of how it can be recognized and identified as intentional or a natural out break. The paper will also review a case of an outbreak of anthrax in the U.S. and it will be shown why it is considered as an intentional act rather than a natural outbreak. The paper further gives personal views with justifications being made why terrorists would prefer to use bioterrorism on population. The essay will lastly carry out an article review in the author gives her personal opinion on the issue of military anthrax vaccination. The essay is divided into four sections to make it easier to achieve the essay specifications.
According to Pavlin (1999), distinguishing bioterrorism should be done at the very first stages of the outbreak. The author argues that the very first stages of bioterrorism should be recognized first at the hospital laboratories. When new strains of organism are detected then bioterrorism should be suspected. Pharmacists distributing more antibiotics than expected should be a signal of bioterrorism. He lists the identification of new strains of organisms as one of the clues to be used in the identification of a bioterrorism. He also views the presence of a large epidemic in discreet population with has greater case loads than the normal expectation is also another clue. When a disease becomes more severe than normally expected then it is also an indication of bioterrorism. Pavlin (1999) argues that unusual routes of exposure for a disease ought to be a cause for alarm.
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Furthermore he argues that a disease that is unusual for a given geographical area is also a hint for bioterrorism especially when it occurs outside the transmission season or one whose transmission is impossible outside normal vector transmission. Cases of multiple epidemics occurring at the same time in different areas should also be a cause for alarm. Lastly Pavlin (1999) claims that if a terrorist group claims accountability or had issued a threat and in case evidence of the release of the agent is found out then bioterrorism should be suspected. It should be noted that Pavlin (1999) is careful to note the factors which have listed above have to be cross checked as an indication by one of them might not be necessarily an indication of bioterrorism (Pavlin, 1999).
The outbreak of anthrax in the 1957 in a textile mill has been an issue of much debate in America. The fact that the textile mill was at the same time the site for anthrax vaccine testing makes the whole issue more complicated. Albarelli (2002) carries a story of two people who died from the anthrax contamination. He makes an interesting analysis of the various opinions which have been aired on this issue. He also writes about an urgent need by the Americans to come up with a vaccine because the soviets were suspected to have developed their version (Albarelli, 2002).
Albarelli (2010) also writes about Dr. Nass who had raised security concerns about the mill. Generally, epidemiological evidence is not available to suggest that this was an intentional outbreak or an accident but overwhelmingly there are arguments army is high highly suspected to have caused outbreak for purpose reason to check maybe the effectiveness of the vaccine they were developing (Albarelli, 2002).