Comments on Fouchier’s Calculation of Risk and Elapsed Time for Escape of a Laboratory-Acquired Infection from His Laboratory

Klotz, Lynn C.

A pandemic could result in 140 million fatalities (world popu- lation of 7 billion, 20% infected, 10% fatality rate). Thus, in this example the estimated number of fatalities for the research enterprise could be 3 Ï« 10 -5 Ï« 140 million Ï­ 4,200 fatalities, and the estimated "fatality burden" for each lab in the research enterprise could be 4,200/30 Ï­ 140 fatalities over 10 years or 14 fatalities per year. To put this fatality burden number in perspective, no Institutional Review Board tasked with assessing human subject research would approve a proposed research project with 14 potential fatalities per year. If instead P 1 Ï­ 2 Ï« 10 -4 or P 1 Ï­ 2 Ï« 10 -3 is more representative of the real probability, then the fatalities and fatality burden for each lab in the enterprise would be much higher. Over the assortment of BSL3 and BSL3Ï© labs that may be participating in the research enterprise, frighteningly high fatality burdens may not be unrealistic.