Reply #50: Canadian article gives more detail on what happened - good piece [View All]

[Nothing Without Hope]

I recommend reading the entire article to get the full picture of the timing and sequence of events. It gives the most detail and background and is the clearest on what happened after the vial was opened in Canada of any I have seen yet. Amazing: these virus samples were intended for being used TO PRACTICE viral typing. That means that relatively inexperienced, probably young (and thus fully susceptible) lab personnel anywhere in the world could have been exposed, and with today's rapid air transit, I shudder at what might have resulted. At a time before common air travel, "only" up to 5 million people died from this virus back before it disappeared from human populations.

http://www.canada.com/vancouver/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=77f9ea35-bec7-448d-b99f-9660ce3522e1

Vancouver lab mishap alerted world to flu pandemic risk

Potentially deadly strain shipped to 4,000 labs in 18 countries
Pamela Fayerman, Vancouver Sun
Thursday, April 14, 2005

A chain of events that began in a microbiology laboratory in a Vancouver hospital may have helped avert a global pandemic when it was discovered last month that a potentially deadly flu strain had been shipped to 4,000 labs worldwide.

(snip - most of the long article omitted here)

B.C. public health officials said Wednesday it is not believed any laboratory workers or other citizens in the province -- or indeed anywhere in the world -- have contracted the H2N2 influenza strain, which was contained in vials shipped to labs from the United States. The vials containing live virus were produced by a Cincinnati-based test-kit maker and shipped by the College of American Pathologists in February so that lab workers could gain proficiency at typing viral strains for accreditation purposes.

The H2N2 strain hasn't circulated in the world since 1968, so anyone born after that time would have no immunity to it, raising the spectre that if people suddenly did become exposed to it, a pandemic could result. H2N2 is considered one of five candidates for an influenza pandemic.

Dr. Perry Kendall, B.C.'s top public health official, said when the vials were shipped, they were improperly labelled as A/Shanghai, related to the influenza strain that has been circulating in North America this past winter. Kendall said it was "neither sensible nor wise" to send the H2N2 subtype and it was also "unacceptable to mislabel the vials."

(snip)

Have to appreciate the deadly deliberate understatement in the last paragraph: "neither sensible nor wise" and "unacceptable to mislabel the vials."