Network set up to fight back against biological warfare

The US government is funding an international network that could eventually be used to spot biological warfare.

Defence research group, Sandia Laboratories, has set up pilot trials between rural hospitals in Russia and New Mexico to share research on a new chronic illness, Hepatitis-C. If trials of the Cooperative Disease Monitoring Project are successful, Sandia will extend the project to cover acute diseases transmitted by biological weapons.

Sandia MD, Alan Zelicoff, hopes that his project will show doctors around the world a new way to work. "I have provided the doctors with sampling equipment, data monitoring resources and CU See-Me video conferencing tools," he said. He believed the result would be far more sophisticated than the leading health information network ProMED, which is funded by the University of Rockefeller.

"ProMED is basically an email list where doctors report on disease around the world," said Zelicoff. "We are setting up centres of excellence within each hospital where doctors can actually prevent and cure disease, using shared data in a common format."

As the network spreads, Sandia Laboratories will look out for unusual outbreaks as part of its remit to monitor diseases such as anthrax, which can be spread by biological weapons.