MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Baxter International, the company that brought us contaminated Chinese heparin, has struck again. The Toronto Sun reported earlier this year that it released live flu virus material in Austria.
The World Health Organization is closely monitoring the situation. The contaminated product was a mix of H3N2 seasonal flu viruses and unlabelled H5N1 live avian flu viruses. The viruses could have combined to create an even more dangerous hybrid.
People familiar with biosecurity rules are dismayed by evidence that human H3N2 and avian H5N1 viruses somehow co-mingled in the Orth-Donau facility. That is a dangerous practice that should not be allowed to happen, a number of experts insisted.
Accidental release of a mixture of live H5N1 and H3N2 viruses could have resulted in dire consequences.
While H5N1 doesn’t easily infect people, H3N2 viruses do. If someone exposed to a mixture of the two had been simultaneously infected with both strains, he or she could have served as an incubator for a hybrid virus able to transmit easily to and among people.
That mixing process, called reassortment, is one of two ways pandemic viruses are created.
Amazingly, Baxter refused to reveal information about how the accident happened because of fear of revealing “trade secrets.” According to the Toronto Sun:
Earlier this week [Baxter spokesman Christopher] Bona called the mistake the result of a combination of “just the process itself, (and) technical and human error in this procedure.”
He said he couldn’t reveal more information because it would give away proprietary information about Baxter’s production process.
The cavalier attitude of Baxter towards the release of live flu virus is the same attitude we see in the Heparin case. Baxter failed to secure its supply lines, failed to adequately test, failed to adequately inspect, and when the contamination was discovery, failed to perform an adequate recall. In its quest to grasp the low hanging fruits and profits it ignores the safety of those it should be protecting. It is the same attitude that has plagued Baxter for decades.
For some very interesting history of Baxter International, go to Wikipedia and read the history of Baxter International.
Labels: Baxter, Baxter Heparin, Chinese heparin, Heparin, heparin lawsuit, heparin lawyer
