UW-Madison professor Gary Splitter conducted his infectious disease research in one of the universityâ??s highest security labs. To work with brucella, a restricted germ, he and his staff had to pass FBI background checks and fill out piles of paperwork. Despite the precautions, at least two of his staff got infected with brucellosis â?? one with cysts in the brain. And in a separate incident, members of Splitterâ??s lab broke federal rules by creating an unauthorized, drug-resistant strain of the disease. The problems in Splitterâ??s lab highlight potential risks of dealing with biological materials. An investigation into the unauthorized experiments cost him dearly â?? he lost his lab privileges for five years â?? but it also revealed serious deficiencies in the universityâ??s biosafety system. Two reports show UW-Madison allowed its Office of Biological Safety to crumble in recent years, at the same time that research on campus was growing dramatically.
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