County, city to establish lab advisory board [The Frederick News-Post, Md.]

Aug. 27--Frederick County and city leaders agreed on the basic details of a community advisory committee to coordinate with local containment laboratories.

The idea for the committee stemmed from a March report by the National Research Council, which said the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases ought to engage in more effective two-way communication with the surrounding community. Taking a step beyond NRC recommendations, the committee will address all containment labs in the county, said USAMRIID commander Col. John Skvorak at a Thursday meeting of county and municipal elected officials.

At issue is the environmental and health impact that four labs have on the surrounding areas: USAMRIID, the Department of Homeland Security's National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures Center and the National Institutes of Health's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases all sit on Fort Detrick, and the Southern Research Institute is located on Aviation Way.

The committee would consist of nine people -- one city and one county representative, one from the life sciences field and one from the private health sector, and five local residents. The committee would meet quarterly to discuss updates on what the labs are doing and address residents' concerns.

Eileen Mitchell, deputy commander of the U.S. Army Garrison at Fort Detrick, said she wanted to make clear to the community that even though Fort Detrick would attend the meetings and provide information to members, it was not in any way in control of the committee or its agenda. Skvorak agreed, adding that "this committee would have no direct control over the laboratories, it is an information exchange capability."

Resident Beth Willis spoke at the meeting, saying she wanted the committee to be mindful of seeking solutions for residents' concerns instead of just relaying the labs' messages to the public. But County Commissioner David Gray, a driving force behind the NRC review that sparked the committee's creation, seemed optimistic that the committee would be a success.

"There are a lot of people out there who never thought this would happen," he said. "It will be a comfort to our citizens."

USAMRIID provided a draft charter for the committee at the meeting, based on previous discussions with some commissioners and Frederick aldermen. City and county leaders debated a few points, such as whether the labs ought to be represented on the committee -- they eventually decided the labs would have a nonvoting member -- and how often to meet -- quarterly, they decided, unless a pressing situation requires more frequent meetings.

The elected officials promised to announce soon the process for applying to be a committee member. Though the joint city-county board will have some kinks to work out, such as who will provide administrative support and host the meetings, the two boards were united in their desire to get the Frederick County Containment Laboratory Community Advisory Committee up and running quickly.

In a show of open communication between researchers and residents, Fort Detrick officials also updated the elected officials on an upcoming project, a $600 million Medical Countermeasure Test and Evaluation Facility. Whereas most drugs and vaccines must prove effective in human trials before they receive approval from the Food and Drug Administration, some highly infectious diseases cannot be safely tested on humans. This greatly hindered biodefense-related research, so the new facility was proposed as a place to test drugs and vaccines in a biosafety level 3 or 4 environment on nonhuman primates, which the FDA said can substitute for human testing in certain situations.

"There isn't a facility like this anywhere in the world," said George Ludwig, deputy principal assistant for research and technology at the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command.

The facility would be government-owned and contractor-operated, the same as the Homeland Security lab at Fort Detrick. It would address a major backlog in testing countermeasures for diseases that may be emerging as a natural epidemic or could be used in a terrorist attack. The facility, pending the Environmental Impact Study and availability of federal funds, should break ground in 2013 and be completed by 2018.

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