id	author	title	date	pages	extension	mime	words	sentences	flesch	summary	cache	txt
cord-001672-7lh8iqm1	Klotz, Lynn C.	Comments on Fouchier’s Calculation of Risk and Elapsed Time for Escape of a Laboratory-Acquired Infection from His Laboratory	2015-04-14		.txt	text/plain	1348	80	63	I n a Letter to the Editor of mBio, Professor Ron Fouchier published a calculation (1) in which he finds a very low probability, P 1 , for a laboratory-acquired infection (LAI) for a single lab for a single year. Fouchier uses a simplistic formula, y ϭ 1/P 1 , to calculate the elapsed time in years for an LAI to escape from his laboratory, y ϭ 1/(1 ϫ 10 -6 ) ϭ 1 ϫ 10 6 , that is, the million years stated in his Letter. I suggest attaching little weight to this elapsed time calculation and instead concentrating on risk ϭ likelihood ϫ consequences, starting with the P 1 probability, specifically: potential pandemic fatalities ϭ (probability of a community LAI) ϫ (probability that the community LAI leads to a pandemic) ϫ (estimated fatalities in a pandemic). My risk calculation estimates the likelihood of a community LAI for both a single laboratory and n laboratories conducting this research over y years.	./cache/cord-001672-7lh8iqm1.txt	./txt/cord-001672-7lh8iqm1.txt