Whisting Past The Anthrax Plant

Lansing Vaccine Manufacturer's Neighbors Are a Bit Jittery

By Doug Johnson
Special to The Washington Post
Saturday, October 20, 2001; Page C01

LANSING, Mich.

Life here seems normal, or what passes for normal, these autumn days. Backs still get slapped at the state Capitol, its pinched dome a Victorian echo of Capitol Hill. In the shabby-chic of the Old Town section, proprietors like Tom Powers of Tom's Furniture still wait for the first dribble of customers. School buses disgorge their bounding charges at Willow Elementary, as normal as you please.

Yet, past the Pro-Bowl, where the road squeezes into one lane, is something much less Tom Powers and much more Tom Clancy: What once was a forgettable complex of utilitarian brick buildings is now surrounded by jagged metal, concrete and tension. And under armed guard. Two high fences have gone up, each topped with barbed wire. Behind that is a continuous chain of concrete barriers; behind that, bales of concertina wire. National Guardsmen -- armed and in camouflage -- sit in Humvees and patrol the grounds. At one point, a tank patrolled.

At Andrews Air Force Base, that might feel reassuring. In Lansing, it's scary as hell.

"See, I grew up on a farm," says Powers, fiftyish and flanneled with that directness that comes from life in the cold of northern Michigan. "For us, anthrax was just part of life. . . . You got a sick animal and you call a vet, that's all. You're always thinking about it, but not like this."

In Lansing, anthrax isn't just something that's read about in nervous dispatches from distant cities. Here, anthrax is a local business; anthrax is the neighbor next door. Lansingites try but can't forget that up the road the bacterium is being cultivated at BioPort Corp.

For more than a decade, the old state-owned laboratory, now the privately held BioPort, has been North America's only manufacturer of an anthrax-specific vaccine. It has wandered in and out of the news for at least that long: in 1990 before the Gulf War and later when some in the military raised questions about the vaccine's safety; in 1997 in debates over privatization; then in 2000 as financial and contamination questions loomed. Residents long ago achieved a wobbly peace with the lab and its alternating mix of prestige and proximity to danger.

Until last month. "When all this terrorism started and they began to report about what we have here," says Jean Ferguson, a 44-year-old homemaker, "people just started freaking out."

Conversations are filled with the uncertainties of what to think about the lab, how much to believe, how much to fear.

At 7:50 a.m., the sun is just hitting the Golden Harvest diner in north Lansing and the breakfast buzz has begun. Cooks Derek Deloof, a transplant by way of New Orleans, and Alice -- just Alice, at 70 all gray curls -- have heard little but talk of anthrax and BioPort for the past week.

"The fear factor is nearing hysteria levels -- not really there, but close," says Deloof, between orders of grilled ham and oatmeal. "I mean, let's get a grip!"

Diner Mary Kite pipes up: "I personally want to know why the [Food and Drug Administration] hasn't approved them for three years. What's going on over there?" The conversation is thrown open to the floor. Educator Bill Bartilson, 38, takes aim: "We're trying to pretend like we're not afraid, and that's bull." Two truckers murmur their assent.

Someone, looking up from his eggs, worries aloud whether the anthrax spore powdering the U.S. mail could . . . well, might it have come from . . .

His voice trails off and he returns to his eggs.

Trust is a tall order for residents who have followed BioPort's tarnished management record and less-than-forthcoming response to calls for information. Privatized in September 1998, the facility has twice failed to win FDA certification because of manufacturing and lab procedures that fell short of the agency's requirements. The problems are so serious that the FDA has not allowed BioPort to release its vaccine for the last two years. Just this week, the company reapplied for FDA approval, but in the meantime, it can only stockpile the vaccine.

Exactly how large a stockpile the plant contains is now a military secret. Since 1997, the Department of the Defense has been BioPort's only customer, and it has exclusive rights to all vaccine produced at the plant. Despite the problems, the plant received a $24 million advance payment from the Defense Department in June.

Questionable lab practices and mismanagement are not words community activist Bonnie Bucqueroux wants anywhere near the word anthrax. "First you hear of poor lab practices, then the bunkers start going up, then you hear about this multimillion-dollar bailout just to get things working again, and you start to wonder if they know what they're doing," says Bucqueroux, 56, who has run for Congress on the Green Party ticket.

It's precisely those "bunkers" -- the razor wire, Humvees and Jersey barriers that materialized after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks -- that transformed BioPort from an ignorable neighbor into a bristling encampment.

"What do those buildings contain, exactly?" resident Debra Gorman, 42, wonders aloud. "Could the vaccine be stolen? How safe is it really for us if a plane hit the building?"

She says local living rooms, church basements and other meeting places have been filled with such questions lately, as residents exchange information, gossip, rumor or just worry. "We were concerned before, but when the barbed wire started going up and the tanks came out," she says. "I mean, that really freaked people out."

It was because of the very real possibility of a community-wide freakout that residents organized an informal question-and-answer session with BioPort officials that was slated for Oct. 10.

"People had legitimate worries," says BioPort spokeswoman Kelly Rossman-McKinney, 46.

But hours before the meeting, as news spread and organizers were overwhelmed with resident and media interest, BioPort officials suddenly opted not to come. "We worried that our neighbors' questions would get lost with all the TV cameras and national press," Rossman-McKinney says.

"BioPort initially wasn't communicating with us or with their neighbors, leaving me to try and do the job," says Mayor David Hollister. He says he tried to reassure locals but contends his efforts were undercut by a company more content to hide behind fences than answer questions. Rumors flew. "People called us asking things like, 'If there's an explosion, how long do I have to get my gas mask on?' "

Finally, lab officials made an offer: Residents could submit their questions in writing. After the Defense Department screened the queries, BioPort's communications staff would respond to residents by mail.

Answers about anthrax sent through the mail to jittery residents watching stories on TV about anthrax contracted through the mail? The timing was not propitious.

Eventually, five questions and answers were printed in the local newspaper. For the record: There is a "limited" but undisclosed amount of liquid anthrax -- which may or may not be weapons grade -- kept on-site for undisclosed purposes. Specific security measures are classified, but if a plane were to hit the plant, residents would not be exposed to anthrax spores. Yes, the plant is secure. Yes, the community is safe. Yes, everyone can calm down.

Tom Powers says he and his friends were generally satisfied by the answers. Jean Ferguson will only say, "I haven't seen squat." Bill Bartilson says, "If people just applied critical thinking, they'd settle down." Bonnie Bucqueroux describes the mood of the city as "queasy."

Now they all wish the media would just go away and stop talking about BioPort and anthrax. Perhaps then, they could, too, and get back to normal.

© 2001 The Washington Post Company