Posted on 10/26/2004 10:49:11 PM PDT by Crazieman
Scientists warn of 'ethnic weapons' By Leigh Dayton October 27, 2004 BIOLOGICAL weapons that target selected ethnic groups could become part of the terrorists' arsenal unless governments and scientists act now, the British Medical Association warns.
Such designer weapons would be based on the growing ability of scientists to unravel and compare human DNA.
In theory, experts could engineer organisms to attack genetic variations commonly found in, say, Chinese or German populations.
Genetically engineered anthrax, smallpox and polio viruses are also "approaching reality", the BMA claims in a new report, Biotechnology, Weapons and Humanity II.
The report, released yesterday in London, adds that organisms designed to attack food crops and even human immune and nervous systems are serious threats.
For instance, the agent used by Russian authorities to end the Moscow theatre hostage crisis in 2002, a fentanyl derivative, is an example of a "bio-regulator" targeted against the human nervous system.
"All of the above are feasible or possible if anyone would be mad enough or evil enough to do it," commented University of Melbourne immunologist Sir Gus Nossal.
"There already exist potential biological weapons of enormous destructive power, chief among them smallpox and anthrax," added Professor Emeritus Nossal, who in 1979 announced the eradication of smallpox on behalf of the World Health Organisation.
He agreed with BMA head of science and ethics Vivienne Nathanson that, "If we wait too long it will be virtually impossible to defend ourselves (against biological weapons)".
According to the BMA report the "window of opportunity" to control the spread of powerful biological weapons is shrinking fast.
That's so, said the report's author, Malcolm Dando of Britain's Bradford University, because "the same technology being used to develop new vaccines and find cure's for Alzheimer's and other debilitating diseases could also be used for malign purposes".
Professor Dando said it was essential that governments worldwide beef up the international Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention when it comes up for review in 2006.
The BTWC prohibits signatory states from acquiring biological weapons and means of delivery them.
But eminent Australian microbiologist Frank Fenner questioned the effectiveness of the BMA recommendations.
"It's all very well to say governments ought to adhere to these suggestions, but they didn't adhere to them before and even now the US Government says it's not going to take any notice of the (BTWC)," he said.
According to Emeritus Professor Fenner -- who was central to the development of myxoma virus to control rabbits, as well as the WHO smallpox eradication campaign -- public health strategies designed to respond to biological weapons such as smallpox are more likely to be effective.
In Canberra, a spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said Australia signed the BWTC in 1972 and ratified it in 1977.
Scary stuff when it comes down the the very idea of such a weapon.
Ethnic weapons? Is that another term for a "black gun"?
Interesting that htye are actually researching this. For a long time I have thought about weapons like this and if they were possible :) Thought i was just crazy though. Apparently my mind is not so strange as i thought.
Even scarier: a weapon that combine nano-tech and bio-tech. A kind of microbiological "Borg."
Actually, considering current trends in the world...W.A.S.P.s and others of European stock, might have something to worry about....
Until they locate a "conservative" gene....
It led to the Eugenics war in the Star Trek universe.... just after WW3
see the pathology of conservatism:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1251929/posts
That's a wonderful example, it killed/incapcitated over a hundred Russian hostages. Only one hostage was killed by a bullet, the Russian gas got the rest.
Now if they could develop a weapon that only destroys those with the Liberal or Dem gene, I wouldn't be so alarmed.
I thought such a genetic weapon would be in the realm of possibility. The crazy Islamists would love to release a lethal virus upon the world that only activated upon non-Arabic hosts.
I'm not even sure genetic selectivity would be desirable, they would love to rid the world of as many infidels as possible, so just come to America to realease an air-borne ebola virus.
What's a couple of billion people dead to them? As long as more than half of them are infidels it would be Allah's will in their minds.
BTTT
It will mutate. We will die. Life finds a way.
They do a better job on themselves than any "biotechnology" could ever hope to accomplish! ; )
The ACLU won't allow it.
I doubt it. For one thing, there's not much to work with. There are very few alleles that are exclusive to specific races. The amount of genetic variation within each race is large compared to the differences between two races.
More importantly, the differences that distinguish between the races tend to relate to superficial climate adaptations like skin color and hair texture, which are unlikely to be exploitable to deadly effect.
In theory. This is an overhyped exagerated idea.
Engineering smallpox or anthrax or other bio-wepaons is completley unrelated but is, unfortunately, very possible now.
It even was done to some degree by the Soviets by more conventional means than current directed DNA manipulations.
Release of smallpox, engineered or not, is still a serious concern and the possibility that Iraq had the ability to manufacture it was undoubtably one of the major reasons for going in to Iraq.
Because there's been three years since 911 people aren't thinking about these things too much.
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