Remember: April 13, the Institut Pasteur announced the disappearance – mysterious – of some 2,349 test tubes containing strains of the virus of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome), this disease of the family of coronavirus which caused more than 700 deaths between 2002 and 2003, mainly in Asia.
These samples did not present “any risk of infection”, assures the Institut Pasteur. However, the National Agency for the Safety of Medicines and Health Products (ANSM) had nonetheless launched a large-scale investigation from April 8 to 12, without however discovering what it had become of the stumps.
But the case does not end there: Tuesday, May 21, 2014, another twist. The Mediapart news site reveals that, shortly after the announcement from the Institut Pasteur, the ANSM carried out a surprise inspection in the high-security laboratory where the tubes Were in storage.
Many anomalies in the security system
Result: a confidential report, co-signed by Marisol Touraine, Minister of Social Affairs, and Benoît Hamon, Minister of National Education and Research, which denounces numerous anomalies in the system. Security center of the Institut Pasteur. “Unsecured freezers”, “no video surveillance”, traceability problems … So many irregularities, to say the least worried aunts.
Are laboratory safety procedures up to the level of the biological agents handled therein? To answer this question, ministers Marisol Touraine and Benoît instructed two government inspectors to check “all of the high biological safety laboratories at the Institut Pasteur”. In total, 18 laboratories and two animal facilities will be scrutinized. The first conclusions of the experts are expected by May 31, and their final report should be published at the end of July.
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