
The Existential Consequences of Lab Errors - smacktoward
https://slate.com/technology/2019/08/end-times-h5n1-genetic-engineering-lab-errors.html
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ubermonkey
Am I alone in seeing the "slate.com" domain and deciding not to bother
clicking?

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cafard
No.

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cryoshon
i worked in an HIV research lab for three years. we were trying to find a
vaccine.

in the lab, many of the things we did might have been considered "gain of
function" research because we were artificially creating viral particles which
had properties which we either assumed were already in the wild (but we had no
sample of) or directly scientifically fruitful to explain some facet of the
disease. the chances are good that the viruses we made would be somewhat more
dangerous to a person than a wild type virus, but really we did not care about
that beyond the confines of the cell culture dish.

to be honest, the added threat of the viruses we made was never something on
our mind because with a virus like HIV, the risk of a containment breach and
exposure that goes beyond one person is very very low. after all, HIV isn't
airborne, and if you notice you've been exposed, you can get treated quickly
and not contract the disease. for the sake of reference, to work with HIV, you
need biosafety level 2+ facilities.

for something like influenza, however, i cannot possibly imagine working in
conditions more permissive than biosafety level 3, even before performing gain
of function research. maybe a construct which could lend some additional peace
of mind would be to force gain of function research with highly infectious and
easily aerosolizable diseases to use a higher biosafety level than default.
it'd make the research go much slower and be far more expensive, but it's an
additional barrier to the public being exposed -- which is already very
unlikely.

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dekhn
I should add, HIV is generally considered so safe that many labs use it (in a
"deactivated" form) as a vector to move genes into mammalian cells. See
'lentivirus transfer plasmid'.

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jstanley
[https://outline.com/ytrwVX](https://outline.com/ytrwVX)

