Comprehensive Review Of Bioterrorism
Bioterrorism involves the deliberate release of bioweapons to cause death or disease in humans, animals, or plants. Biological weapons may be developed or used as part of a government policy in biological warfare or by terrorist groups or criminals. Biological weapons can initiate large-scale epidemics with an unparalleled lethality, and nation-states and terrorist groups have used dangerous and destructive Biological weapons in the past. This activity reviews the types, evaluation, and treatment of different biological weapons that have been used and has the potential to be used in bioterrorism attacks and discusses the role of the inter-professional team in evaluating and treating catastrophic events associated with bioterrorism.Introduction
Biological weapons are devices or agents used or intended to be used in a deliberate attempt to disseminate disease-producing organisms or toxins using aerosol, food, water, or insect vectors. Their mechanism of action tends to be broadly through infection or intoxication.[1] Bioterrorism involves the deliberate release of bioweapons to cause death or disease in humans, animals, or plants. These biological agents can include bacteria, viruses, toxins, or fungi.[2]Biological weapons may be developed or used as part of a government policy in biological warfare or by terrorist groups or criminals. Biological weapons can initiate large-scale epidemics with an unparalleled lethality, and nation-states and terrorist groups have used dangerous and destructive biological weapons in the past.[1] The degree of the potential damage, coupled with the unpredictable nature of these agents, has led to an increased interest by numerous countries, including the United States, in drawing up policies and guidelines in the event of such an attack to be prepared.
Keeping in mind the horrific nature of these agents, the Geneva protocol, first signed in 1925, and currently signed by 65 out of 121 country states, prohibited the development, production, and use of biological weapons in war.[3] However, not being country states, biological weapons to wage bioterrorism tend to be a relatively common choice for terrorist organizations. The relative ease with which the agents may be deployed, the devastating effects on the victims, and their inexpensive nature make them all more lucrative to these organizations. However, the unpredictable nature of these biological weapons means that they may affect both the intended victims and inadvertently affect friendly forces. Despite this drawback, terrorist organizations favor the use of biological weapons.[2]
Healthcare professionals need to be aware of the essentials of bioterrorism and biological weapons, as these may be used as part of a terrorist attack in any part of the world. Thus, healthcare professionals need to be trained and prepared in case of a potentially catastrophic event, where quick action and decision-making may potentially save lives. This article reviews the previous incidents of biological terrorism, types of biological weapons, evaluation of patients exposed to potential biological weapons, and treatment of patients who have been potentially exposed to the various commonly employed biological weapons. This article also aims to discuss an inter-professional team's role in evaluating and managing a bioterrorism attack. For this activity, bioterrorism's biological weapons have been broadly classified under four major headings, including bacterial agents, viral agents, fungal agents, protozoal agents, and toxins.
Since the article is too long, I only shared the introductory part.
Comprehensive Review of Bioterrorism - StatPearls - NCBI Bookshelf
Biological weapons are devices or agents used or intended to be used in a deliberate attempt to disseminate disease-producing organisms or toxins using aerosol, food, water, or insect vectors. Their mechanism of action tends to be broadly through infection or intoxication.[1] Bioterrorism...
Volume 35, 2020 - Issue 4: Health Security IntelligenceHealth security intelligence: engaging across disciplines and sectors
ABSTRACT
This article introduces the Special Issue on Global Health Security. It provides an overview of the health security threat spectrum, tracing how perceptions of biological and health security threats have evolved in broad terms over the last century from deliberately introduced disease outbreaks to also incorporate natural disease outbreaks, unintended consequences of research, laboratory accidents, lack of awareness, negligence, and convergence of emerging technologies. This spectrum of threats has led to an expansion of the stakeholders and tools involved in intelligence gathering and threat assessments.
The article argues that to strengthen global health security and health intelligence, the traditional state-based intelligence community must actively engage with non-security stakeholders and incorporate space for new sources of intelligence. The aim of the Special Issue is to contribute to the larger effort of developing a multidisciplinary, empirically informed and policy-relevant approach to intelligence-academia engagement in global health security that serves both the intelligence community and scholars from a broad range of disciplines.
INTELLIGENCE AND NATIONAL SECURITY 2020, VOL. 35, NO. 4, 477–492
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The West Africa Ebola outbreak (2014-2016): a Health Intelligence failure?
ABSTRACT
The role of health intelligence (HI) has received little assessment in the West African Ebola outbreak (2014-2016). Using newly declassified information on the outbreak, this research finds significant HI problems that hindered an appropriate response to the outbreak. The Guinean government’s low capacity to deal with the crisis, the government’s misleading assessments of the crisis, the US embassy’s failure to contextualize the information properly in terms of the risks the virus posed, and the US embassy’s willingness to accept the Guinean government’s assessment without criticism were contributing factors in the HI failure in the opening months of the Ebola outbreak.
