The curious case of tuberculosis (and more)

If you have confidence in incident reports filed with NIH, then you probably think that the vast majority of BSL-3 lab accidents are caused by tuberculosis researchers like this one. I have rather many doubts about that.

[Today includes discussion of a sewage spill at USDA’s Ames, Iowa lab, and an interesting incident of the biosafety staff at a major northeastern institution rebelling against an IBC reluctant to report problems.]

You’d be forgiven for thinking that this post is about a tuberculosis lab accident. It’s not. At least not exactly. It’s about many of them, and what they mean, and don’t mean, as best as I can determine at this point in time.

For the past several months I’ve had FOIA pending with NIH for reports of lab accidents. In some cases, I am also requesting such reports directly from the institutions themselves. At this point, neither process is complete, so my observations are based on incomplete data.

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