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Posted on 10/03/2001 3:01:17 PM PDT by lds23

The Threat Of Bioterrorism And The Spread Of Infectious Diseases

Testimony of Frank J. Cilluffo

Chairman, Committee on Combating Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Terrorism,
Homeland Defense Initiative Center for Strategic and International Studies
Before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations
05 September 2001

Chairman Biden, Senator Helms, distinguished committee members, it is a privilege to appear before you today to discuss this important matter. I would like to commend you for squarely facing this complex challenge.

Although there is no way to predict with certainty the biological warfare threat to the homeland in the short-term or the long-term, it is widely accepted that unmatched U.S. power (economic, cultural, diplomatic, and military) is likely to cause America's adversaries to favor "asymmetric" attacks over direct conventional military confrontations. These strategies and tactics aim to offset our strengths and exploit our weaknesses. Against this background, military superiority in itself is no longer sufficient to ensure our nation's security.

A major terrorist incident on U.S. soil involving chemical weapons, conventional explosives or most glaringly, biological warfare (BW) agents, would put our emergency management response to the test at the local, state, and federal levels.

There is a real danger of being overwhelmed - two simultaneous bombings of the magnitude of Oklahoma City or a large-scale release of sarin or VX nerve gas - could strain our current system to the point of bursting. In both cases, if no advance warning was available, local and state emergency responders such as firefighters, police, and paramedics would arrive on the scene first. They would be followed by federal assets hours or perhaps days later. It would be a race against time to turn victims into patients. In the case of a chemical attack the window is likely small, the so-called "golden hour," to administer life saving antidotes. It may take months to complete decontamination, recovery and reconstitution efforts, and decades for the community to come to grips with the tragedy and begin healing. In both cases, however tragic, there would be an immediate explosive or toxic effect to respond to, not necessarily so for a covert attack in which biological weapons were used.

It could take days, or even weeks, for the symptoms of a biological agent to begin to manifest themselves. In the case of a BW attack, the first responder, the very tip of the spear, is likely to be a primary care physician, healthcare provider, veterinarian, agricultural services inspector, or perhaps an entomologist. Given the unheralded nature of these silent killers, it would fall upon the public health and medical communities to detect the attack, contain the incident, and treat the victims. The delayed onset of symptoms, coupled with the fact that it is difficult to discern a deliberate BW attack like small pox from a naturally occurring infectious disease outbreak, makes attribution and identification of the perpetrators exceedingly difficult. Moreover, this type of attack can wreak havoc with the public, which must confront fear of the unknown.

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