U.S. unprepared for disease outbreak.

• Position: Bioterrorism

More than 140,000,000 people fly into the U.S. from overseas every year. Most flights take fewer than 24 hours--far less than the 12-day incubation period for smallpox. The upshot? A contagious disease outbreak overseas--such as SARS--whether natural or due to bioterrorism, could spread to America long before an epidemic is recognized.

Christopher Chyba, associate professor of geological and environmental sciences and codirector of the Stanford (Calif.) Center for International Security and Cooperation, stresses the need for biological security and how it differs from nuclear security. He argues that early detection and containment of a biological attack is the most-effective response to this growing threat. "Not only is there a moral argument for improving international disease surveillance and response, there is a pure national interest argument. We want to detect outbreaks as quickly as possible and shut them down. There's a huge impact in terms of reduction of casualties and economic harm if you can recognize it's happening quickly and therefore can respond quickly."

Unlike the production of nuclear weapons, which still greatly depend on large, expensive facilities, biological weapons can be made in a variety of settings that could be harder to detect and monitor because they can be designed for more than one purpose. Established strategies used to combat the spread of nuclear weapons--nonproliferation and deterrence--are less effective in stopping the spread of biological weapons. Unlike nuclear weapons that require highly enriched uranium or weapons-grade plutonium--substances that are complicated and expensive to manufacture--biological agents can be obtained from natural disease outbreaks or even from laboratories...