Melioidosis - Biological Warfare Potential

Biological Warfare Potential

There has been interest in melioidosis because it has the potential to be developed as a biological weapon. It is classed by the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) as a Category B agent. B. pseudomallei, like its relative B. mallei which causes Glanders, was studied by the U.S. as a potential biological warfare agent, but was never weaponized. It has been reported that the Soviet Union was also experimenting with B. pseudomallei as a biological warfare agent.

Read more about this topic:  Melioidosis

Famous quotes containing the words biological, warfare and/or potential:

    Much of the ill-tempered railing against women that has characterized the popular writing of the last two years is a half-hearted attempt to find a way back to a more balanced relationship between our biological selves and the world we have built. So women are scolded both for being mothers and for not being mothers, for wanting to eat their cake and have it too, and for not wanting to eat their cake and have it too.
    Margaret Mead (1901–1978)

    Dying is a troublesome business: there is pain to be suffered, and it wrings one’s heart; but death is a splendid thing—a warfare accomplished, a beginning all over again, a triumph. You can always see that in their faces.
    George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)

    Laughing at someone else is an excellent way of learning how to laugh at oneself; and questioning what seem to be the absurd beliefs of another group is a good way of recognizing the potential absurdity of many of one’s own cherished beliefs.
    Gore Vidal (b. 1925)