Natural or Deliberate Outbreak in Pakistan: How to Prevent or Detect and Trace its Origin: Biosecurity, Surveillance, Forensics

Abstract

Over the last few decades biosecurity and biosafety have emerged as a prominent public health concern due to some high-profile accidents. Effective strategies to deal with the outbreak, whether deliberate or non-deliberate requires a multidisciplinary approach and coordinated decision-making by various state departments such as health, forensics, agriculture, environment, intelligence, law and enforcement, etc. In a dynamic global environment and the overwhelming asymmetric threats from the non-state actors, it is of utmost importance to understand the biosecurity issues and initiate a coordinated global effort to cope with biosecurity and biosafety breaches and develop an as effective response mechanism. An attractive choice for the terrorists, state enemies and non-state actors is the use of biological weapons. An unwanted incident may not only bring chaos to the people, but also can inflict severe economic damage industrially and locally as was in the notorious foot-and-mouth disease outbreak. Because of special geopolitical compulsion, Pakistan is one of the hot spots where special action needs to be taken. The current review focuses on the various approaches, technologies that can be used to alleviate the chances of biosafety and biosecurity incident and emphasizes the role of modern technology that can be used in this regard.

Bioterrorism, an Emerging Threat

“…Flash floods caused by torrential monsoon rains damaged crops in 2015. Pakistan can be beleaguered with biological weapons on the pillars of economy such as food, agriculture, human resource, and livestock (Shinwari et al, 2014).…”

Preemptive and Proactive Strategies for Food Control and Biosecurity

“…There were also attempts carried out by the Japanese-based "Aum Shinrikyo" organization in the 1990s to spread anthrax and botulinum toxin (Parker, 2002). There are many more examples of how microorganisms can be a source of economic damages, already reviewed by (Shinwari et al, 2014).…”

“…Often the labs are understaffed or lack an expert or equipment (Wheelis et al, 2002). Zoopathological and phytopathological labs should be built with highly sensitive equipment (Shinwari et al, 2014). International trade and globalization of food and agricultural markets have also provided ways of pathogen introduction.…”

“…About 62% of the human resources are estimated to be linked to agriculture directly or indirectly. Livestock has been a massive contributor (53.2%) to the agriculture setup in the form of fisheries, hatcheries, and poultries (Shinwari et al, 2014). Dairy farming is a popular business making Pakistan the third largest milk producing country.…”

Pakistans Bio-Preparedness With Regard To Biosecurity, Biodefense Strategies and Policy Measures

“…In addition to this, formation of a rapid response force with proper training and resources to manage a bio-threat catastrophe which includes public health managers, public safety and security providers (forensics, intelligence), law and policy makers working in close coordination with each other [17,18].…”