FrontPageMagazine.com - Bioterrorism: Myths and Realities
In recent days, the public has become increasingly concerned with the threat of “bioterrorism.” Bioterrorism, encompasses no one discipline or field of study, but rather represents a general phrase that encompasses an emerging threat to civilization. It brings together experts from a variety of scientific and public disciplines, including engineers, microbiologists (and their associated disciplines such as biochemistry and genetics), physicians, epidemiologists, law enforcement and other government agencies, and even non-scientific academics such as sociologists and historians. Bioterrorism, however, has been so sensationalized by the media, that now its perceived threat is far greater than its actual threat. Bioterror agents—anthrax, for example, which was the choice weapon of the 2001 attacks against Congress—are more accurately named a “weapon of mass hysteria.” It is very difficult, complicated, and expensive to manufacture an effective bioweapon. Yet the use of such a weapon, an effective one, could cause lethal harm and irrevocable damage. Although we have made notable preventative and precautionary measures against bioterrorism, they have not all been implemented.

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