We were lucky that the anthrax attack shortly after 9/11 was perpetuated by a lone, deranged scientist in a US Army research facility. We were lucky that the attack was limited in extent. If the attack had been carried out by a group sponsored by a criminal state, the damage could have been extensive, sufficient even to immobilize for months inter-regional personal travel and freight and mail delivery service in the US and curtail import of cargo and persons into the nation from outside.
The capability to weaponize biological agents is not universal; but it is held by significant enemies of the US, including Syria, Iran, and North Korea, and probably Cuba. Any one of these states could easily pass biological agents to terror groups, their own (e.g., Hezbollah) or an independent group (e.g., Al Qaeda).
It is not reassuring, then, to read that, after six years of efforts to erect counter-measures to bioterrorism, some experts think that our approach has the wrong priorities. Most of the current effort is directed to emergency response and containment of an bioagent event. The ease with which a biological agent could be distributed throughout the US (imagine 500 anthrax letters mailed from around the country to key personnel at political, commercial, and military centers) means that even a small event could produce a tremendous disaster in multiple cities. So some experts believe we must focus more on prevention. And that, alas, is the more difficult of the two chores.
Finally, I wonder, wouldn't some civilian training to deal with a biosecurity alert and/or event be useful? Would not a civil defense program (or civilian preparedness program, if you prefer a different name) be useful here?
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