Health experts warn on animal diseases used as biological weapons

Anthrax can be used to create a biological weapon

The World Health Organization (WHO), animal health and national defense officers announced on June 30 the need for a wider international cooperation to sidestep the spread of animal diseases that could potentially be utilized as deadly biological weapons.

 

MUNTINLUPA, PHILIPPINES (Catholic Online) - "History has shown that animal diseases have often been used as weapons before. Advances in genetics can now make them even more harmful. So we are calling for further investment to be made at national level on bio security," Bernard Vallat, the director general of the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), stated in a conference about biological threat reduction.

Vallat, shared that 60 percent of human diseases come from animal agents and 80 percent of the agents that could be used for bio terrorism originate from animals. Bird flu is the latest example of a virus that has taken the lives of hundreds of people.

Aside from occurring naturally, The OIE and the WHO warned that animal disease agents could intentionally, from laboratories, be used as biological weapons. Kenneth Myers, Director of the U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), emphasized the need for international alliance to avoid the loss of biological material.

According to Myers, "Terrorists have clearly shown they will use any weapons at their disposal."

He added that disease agents are easy to transport and hard to identify.

Held in Paris, the conference on ‪‎biothreat reduction is the first conference ever to gather experts from the ‪‎OIE, ‪‎WHO, the ‪United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization FAO, international police agency I‪nterpol and other health representatives from various sectors from over 120 countries.

The Pentagon explained the U.S. military has sent live samples of anthrax to dozens of U.S. labs and to five other countries outside of the U.S. Anthrax can potentially be used as biological weapons.

---

'Help Give every Student and Teacher FREE resources for a world-class Moral Catholic Education'

Copyright 2021 - Distributed by Catholic Online