Has the threat of bioterrorism been overestimated? Are Aum Shinrikyo-like attacks the wave of the future? Some like the Bioterrorism Preparedness and Defense Program of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and the Center for Civilian Biodefense Studies at Johns Hopkins feel that today’s terrorists have less to lose by unleashing a biological or chemical threat, and raise the hue and cry about our unpreparedness. Others such as Milton Leitenberg of
the University of Maryland Center for
International
Security Studies feel such claims are alarmist, and that “only the most sophisticated
terrorist organizations could master the complicated process
of launching a biological weapons attack. Most countries
that experimented with biological warfare in the 1970s
eventually gave up because the results were discouraging. ” Economist