Infections not listed in BU bid for biolab

In making its case last year for government approval of a high-security biodefense laboratory, Boston University Medical Center touted the safety record of its existing laboratories, saying in written environmental impact statements in July and August that no "laboratory-acquired infections" of workers had occurred in the last decade.

But BU failed to correct those documents after it determined in November that three lab workers had been infected with the tularemia bacterium, and state and city officials subsequently signed off on the lab based on the outdated reports.

Under state environmental regulations, BU was obligated to correct any errors in the 7-inch-thick report, according to Joseph O'Keefe, spokesman for the state Executive Office of Environmental Affairs. Yesterday, state environmental officials asked BU to provide details of the infections as the first step in deciding whether to reopen the state environmental review.

Federal officials are conducting a separate environmental review, based on documents filed in October that include the same safety assertions BU made to the state. That federal review, conducted by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, is the final hurdle for the project.

"The purpose of these documents is to provide open and informed decision-making," said Carrie Schneider, a staff lawyer at the Conservation Law Foundation, which has opposed the lab. "If it is based on incorrect information, the whole process becomes meaningless."

BU spokeswoman Ellen Berlin declined to say why university officials have not corrected the reports. "It doesn't change the stellar safety record we have," she said, adding that the university's "first obligation in this incident was to ensure there was no public health risk and to report the incident to . . . local, state, and federal public health authorities."

BU also did not inform the public until reporters asked about the illnesses this week, and they asserted that there was no public health threat because tularemia is not spread from person to person. BU officials also said the infection of workers in a lower-security lab was not relevant to the public debate over the high-security facility, which will work with the world's most dangerous pathogens, such as ebola and plague.

But safety concerns are at the heart of opposition to the high-security lab, called a Biosafety Level 4 lab. Critics, including some who live in the South End neighborhood where the lab is planned, say they fear that the potentially lethal toxins that will be studied could endanger residents.

BU has said the lab will contain multiple safety systems to protect the public. In the environmental reports, submitted to the state Executive Office of Environmental Affairs on Aug. 11 and to the Boston Redevelopment Agency on July 30, BU said it had an exemplary safety record in 373 labs that are ranked at safety levels 2 and 3, which have worked with toxic substances including anthrax, ricin, and tularemia.

"The employee accident reports from the last 10 years have been thoroughly reviewed, and it has been confirmed that no laboratory-acquired infections from research work in BSL-2 and BSL-3 laboratories has occurred," the reports state.

However, BU acknowledged this week that two employees of a level 2 lab were infected with tularemia in May and another fell ill in September. The employees thought they were working with a safe strain of the bacterium, but instead they were exposed to a more dangerous strain, BU officials have said.

BU says no one suspected tularemia was the cause of the illnesses until after the September case emerged, and that the tularemia infection was not confirmed until Nov. 12. BU reported the infections to the state Department of Public Health and the Boston Public Health Commission in November, but did not tell state and city officials who were reviewing environmental documents.

Unaware of the tularemia problem, the state environmental secretary certified on Nov. 15 that the level 4 lab proposal met state requirements to disclose all environmental impacts of the lab, including its impact on public safety. That cleared the way for state permits covering road and sewer access, among other things.

The BRA staff approved the project Dec. 14, and the Zoning Commission signed off on Jan. 5, also without learning of the tularemia infections. Environmental officials said they learned of the problems this week when they were reported in the Globe, and BRA officials learned of it when called Tuesday by Mayor Thomas M. Menino's staff.

O'Keefe, the state environmental spokesman, said yesterday that the state can reopen the environmental review if it determines that the leaders of a project "knowingly or inadvertently concealed a material fact or submitted false information." He said state regulations require BU to correct its filing. Based on the corrected information, he said, state officials will decide whether it substantially changes the proposal and requires further review.

However, the situation is different at the BRA, according to spokeswoman Susan Elsbree. The BRA considers the environmental report "a snapshot in time" and does not require any updates, even if things have changed, she said. She said the BRA focused on building and zoning issues and left the public health questions to other agencies. However, she said, the BRA believed that "based on our very thorough analysis, the measures in place in a level 4 lab don't allow for this [kind of problem] to happen."

Douglas Wilkins -- a lawyer for the community group Safety Net, which has filed suit to overturn the state environmental review on other grounds -- said yesterday that "BU had an obligation to come forward" and correct the documents before officials acted on the reports.

"They were acting on information that was inaccurate, and BU knew that," said Wilkins. "If it was material to BU's argument to begin with, it's certainly material now. These revelations go directly to their reliability and integrity, and I can't think of anything that's more material when you're talking about a level 4 bioterrorism facility."

BU officials provided a private briefing yesterday for six Boston city councilors, in a meeting arranged by Menino and Council President Michael Flaherty. At the meeting, BU officials promised to attend a public hearing councilors are planning for late February or early March, according to two councilors who were present.

Alice Dembner can be reached at Dembner@globe.com.