A Compendium of Prior and Current Microbial Risk Assessment Methods
Citation:
NICHOLS, T., J. Choich, I. BAUMEL, C. SONICH-MULLIN, P. R. JUTRO, AND Syracuse Research Corp. A Compendium of Prior and Current Microbial Risk Assessment Methods. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, 2007.
Impact/Purpose:
Following the events of September 11, 2001, EPA’s mission expanded beyond safeguarding the natural environment – air, water, and land – from traditional sources of pollution. With the nation under continued threat from those who seek to harm it, EPA also has the important responsibility of helping to protect the environment from terrorist threats. Several Homeland Security Presidential Directives describe EPA’s responsibilities, which are outlined in EPA’s Homeland Security Strategy. One of the most important issues facing EPA’s National Homeland Security Research Center (NHSRC) is the development of a biological risk assessment methodology. No consensus-based methodology exists for evaluating biological threat contaminants and establishing cleanup levels. This Compendium of Prior and Current Microbial Risk Assessment Methods is one of the first steps toward establishing such a methodology. The Compendium NHSRC recognized that microbial risk assessment (MRA) methodology was at an early stage of development and that the methods applied in MRAs had not been systematically compiled, analyzed, and evaluated for their application to biothreat incident assessment. NHSRC’s Threat and Consequence Division (TCAD) therefore set out to acquire all existing information and research related to prior and current efforts regarding microbial risk assessment. They evaluated the information acquired, selected the most relevant literature, and prepared a compendium of the most applicable information on MRA methods. The information gathered and presented here will be used to establish a preliminary framework and integrated methods to support threat incident-based biological risk assessments. The approaches described will be utilized in developing a future MRA methodology for biothreat agents, as well as in developing the procedures needed to establish appropriate cleanup levels following intentional contamination with biological hazards. A great many studies were examined to ensure that the compendium would be a comprehensive review of the field. For the relevant studies, the references appear in Appendix A. The subsections of the appendix cover exposure assessment, dose-response, risk characterization, hazard identification, and excluded studies. Secondary references not reviewed are listed in Appendix B, and related references dealing with particle deposition are included as Appendix C. The body of this compendium report gives an overview of the studies in the compendium, describes how these studies were selected for inclusion, and presents the roadblocks and deficiencies encountered in the literature as regards TCAD’s objectives, with approaches to circumventing or remedying them where possible.
Description:
Report