World’s most dangerous labs RANKED: China scores ZERO out of 100 for handling risky pathogen studies

Countries with the laxest rules governing laboratories that house the world’s most dangerous pathogens were today named and shamed.

Saudi Arabia, Gabon, and Cote d’Ivoire came bottom of the pile in terms of safety standards inside Biosaftey Level 4 labs, secretive sites which often harbor pathogens like smallpox, Ebola and Lassa fever.  

Canada, the US, Australia and the UK had some of the best standards overall, according to infectious disease experts who ranked all known facilities across the world.

China, however, ranked middle of the pile overall.   

This graph shows the countries wither either operational or planned high risk labs ranked by the strength of their biorisk management polices that could prevent a deadly pathogen from being released or developed. The lower the score, the fewer or weaker the measures in place

This graph shows rules and restrictions governing research that could make high risk pathogens deadlier. Only Canada, the US and UK scored 50 or more

Yet when it came to dual research, a branch of experiments that can include ‘gain of function’ – which carries the risk of making pathogens more deadly, it scored zero out of 100.  

One of these noted by the experts is China’s infamous Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), which is thought by some experts to have accidently unleashed the original Covid virus onto the world in 2020. 

The lab has been accused of conducting experiments intentionally modifying pathogens to make them more dangerous, a practise which experts fear could trigger the next pandemic.

Such research can include incredibly controversial ‘gain of function’ studies.

This is where scientists intentionally make pathogens more infectious, deadly, or more resistant to drugs or vaccines.

Defenders of the practise say such scientific work helps prepare for the potential natural evolution of viruses and bacteria, giving experts a head-start on research to combat them.

But critics claim the labs doing this work risk unleashing the next global pandemic if the pathogen they are working on ever breaches containment.

Some even suspect this has already happened, with the leak of such an engineered virus from the WIV into the Wuhan wet markets and then to the rest of the world one of suspected origins of the pandemic that has claimed millions of lives.

The infamous lab carried out studies on types of coronaviruses found in bats, with some arguing this work constituted gain of function experiments, though others refute this.

Now an international team of experts have ranked the countries with the best and worst rules and regulations governing BSL-4 labs.

While China scored 0 for research regulations, it was not the worst performer overall. 

Each of the 27 countries with an operational BSL-4 lab, or one under construction or planned, was given an overall biorisk management percentage score out of 100.

This represented the strength of its rules on aspects like lab safety, security procedures to stop pathogens being stolen, and research oversight and approval. 

Saudi Arabia, where a lab called the National Health Laboratory is listed as ‘planned’, had the lowest overall score of 6 per cent. 

Gabon in Central Africa was the lowest scorer with an actual operational lab, scoring 8 per cent.

China’ overall management score was in the middle of the pack, 69 per cent. 

The UK and the US were high scorers in overall risk management, ranked fourth and second at 83 per cent and 88 per cent, respectively. 

Canada was the best performer by far, scoring 96 per cent.

This was, in part, due to Canada’s strict rules regarding research on the modification of pathogens, the only country to receive a good ranking in this separate category by Global Biolabs, a team of biosecrity experts which carried out the research.

And this map shows the overall biorisk management scores for nations with either an operational or underway BSL-4 lab. Countries shaded green and ranked as good, yelow medium, and red poor

Pictured: The Wuhan Institute of Virology, where some experts think Covid escaped into the wider world

Virologist Shi Zheng-li works with her colleague in the P4 lab of the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Hubei province – which is at the heart of the lab-leak theory. Nicknamed the ‘Bat Lady’, Zheng-li hunted down dozens of deadly Covid-like viruses in bat caves and studied them at the WIV

In addition to China, other 0 scorers included Belarus, Czech Republic, Gabon, the Philippines, the Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, and Spain.

The UK and the US were only medium performers in this category, scoring 50 per cent each. 

By total biorisk management score, seven countries were rated high (above 70 per cent) 15 score medium (above 30 per cent) and five scored below this. 

In total, the Global Biolabs team found 52 BSl-4 labs in operation around the world, with 17 more either being built or planned. 

Of these 69 the vast majority, four out of five, are in built-up urban areas like cities.

Dr Gregory Koblentz an expert in biodefence at George Mason University in the US, said this proximity to people increases the danger.

’80 per cent are located in urban areas which heightens concerns about accidents at these facilities,’ he said at a webinar unveiling he ranking system. 

He added that the Covid pandemic had seen a boom in countries seeking to expand or establish a BSL-4 labs in their boarders. 

The Global Biolabs team said a critical limitation of their research was that it was based on the rules and regulations as they were written or existed in each country.

Therefore, the results did not reflect how closely they were followed in the labs themselves. 

Dr Filippa Lentzos, an expert in international security at King’s College London and fellow researcher, said: ‘We looked at what was on the books not how things actually operated in practise.’

Dr Lentzos added that a particular worrying aspect of the BSL-4 boom was those countries looking to open their first lab were the bottom scorers in terms of good biorisk management. 

‘Many of the countries that are currently building new maximum containment facilities, some of them for the very first time, are scoring poorly,’ she said.

However, she added, that as the labs were yet to be opened there was still time to bring in rules and regulations that will help reduce the risk of pathogen escape.

The Global Biolabs team also ranked each country hosting a BSL-4 lab by their reliable Governance and their stability.

Whilst two out of three rated good for Governance, only about half scored high in terms of stability. 

The experts noted that most of the planned labs are going to be built in countries who were poor performers in terms of governance and stability as another factor of concern.

The team has called for countries to adopt a set of internationally agreed rules on biorisk management and research on pathogens, committing to sharing best safety and security practises, and fulfil international reporting requirements on their labs. 

They added this should be the case for all labs involved on research in high-risk pathogens, this includes BSL-3 labs which can be hosted at some universities.  

Dr Koblentz said: ‘The work they do can still be dangerous to themselves and the surrounding community.’