FEATURE
The Evolution of Biosafety
For much of the 20 th century, there was little emphasis on laboratory safety or security. Historical accounts can produce hair-raising stories about past practices; from mouth pipetting to storing lunches in refrigerators where specimens were stored, and working on the open bench without personal protective equipment available. Biological safety cabinets were also not commonly available.
“ The formation of the American Biological Safety Association( ABSA) in 1984 to promote safety as a scientific discipline and the availability of OSHA’ s bloodborne pathogen standards in 1992, were key events in the movement to promote biosafety practices in the laboratory,” said Peter Iwen, PhD, D( ABMM), F( AAM), director and senior biosafety officer of the Nebraska Public Health Laboratory.“ And then when [ US Department of Health and Human Services ] put out their rule on the storage and transfer of select agents, that was when the idea of biosafety and biosecurity for laboratories really started.”
Into this fledgling biosafety sphere came the anthrax events of 2001, reinforcing the fact that even though laboratories had started a move towards greater safety and protection for their staff, there was still much work to do. Add in the Ebola virus outbreak of 2014 – 2016, and then the COVID-19 pandemic in the 2020s, and
“ We now recognize biosafety and biosecurity as scientific disciplines, where previously they were an afterthought. We’ ve learned more about the importance of risk assessments and the development of biosafety guidelines with every biological event.”
— Peter Iwen, PhD, D( ABMM), F( AAM) biosafety has now become a top priority for public health laboratory operations.
“ We now recognize biosafety and biosecurity as scientific disciplines, where previously they were an afterthought,” said Iwen.“ We’ ve learned more about the importance of risk assessments and the development of biosafety guidelines with every biological event.”
Tim Southern, PhD, D( ABMM), was a post-doctoral clinical microbiology fellow in Iwen’ s laboratory during the Ebola virus outbreak.
“ We weren’ t just testing samples, we were supporting the care of individuals with an awful disease,” he said.“ We were bagging samples, sanitizing the bags, putting them in coolers and walking those samples between laboratories through corridors with other people and patients.” Now as director of the Nevada State Public Health Laboratory, Southern knows that his experience was a career-thinking game changer.
“ Pete and other team members instilled in me very quickly the importance of laboratory biosafety including critical activities like performing risk assessments that ultimately keep staff and programs safe. Quality was also a daily focus for the Nebraska team; we focused on all aspects of quality as it related to diagnostic testing and patient care.”
Today’ s 21 st century public health laboratory not only incorporates biosafety and biosecurity awareness but also sees how risk assessments and continuous training ensure data quality and quality assurance for all laboratory activities. In 1995, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention( CDC) created the Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity for Prevention and Control of Emerging Infectious Diseases( ELC) cooperative agreement. This included funds that have been traditionally used to subsidize biosafety and biosecurity initiatives within public health laboratories. After the Ebola virus outbreak, CDC provided funds to state and local health departments via the Domestic Ebola Supplement to the ELC, which enabled 62 state, local and territorial public health laboratories to
“ There are going to be impacts to our work going forward, and we have to keep telling our policymakers and anyone who will listen about the criticality of the work we do.”
— Tim Southern, PhD, D( ABMM)
strengthen their biosafety and biosecurity activities.
In early 2025, significant cuts were made to federal funding provided under the ELC cooperative agreement. This funding was a significant source of support for many of the nation’ s public health laboratories and impacted everything from replacement or maintenance contracts for essential laboratory equipment to construction or renovation of laboratory facilities. Along with these impacts, 439 full-time employees within the public health laboratory system were lost, which caused the reduction of elimination of many important testing services, as well as a decrease in personnel trained in biosafety and biosecurity.
“ There are going to be impacts to our work going forward, and we have to keep telling our policymakers and anyone who will listen about the criticality of the work we do,” said Southern.“ But I think they are prepared to hear more from us, and I think we have to be more candid about why what we do is so important and should be funded.”
Automating for the Future
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, public health laboratories embraced testing automation to respond to emergency testing requests as well as to relieve some of the work burden from laboratory staff. With the introduction of large machines to conduct diagnostic testing, however, there came another set of concerns.
16 LAB MATTERS Fall 2025 PublicHealthLabs @ APHL. org
APHL. org