the full details of recent experiments that made a deadly flu virus more contagious will be published, probably within a few months, despite recommendations by the United States that some information be kept secret for fear that terrorists could use it to start epidemics.
The announcement, made on Friday by the World Health Organization, follows two months of heated debate about the flu research. The recommendation to publish the work in full came from a meeting of 22 experts in flu and public health from various countries who met on Thursday and Friday in Geneva at the organization’s headquarters to discuss “urgent issues” raised by the research.
Most of the group felt that any theoretical risk of the virus’s being used by terrorists was far outweighed by the “real and present danger” of similar flu viruses in the wild, and by the need to study them and freely share information that could help identify the exact changes that might signal that a virus is developing the ability to cause a pandemic, said Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who represented the United States at the meeting.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/18/he...-released.html
I disagree with this decision but I don't see how a ban would be enforceable. Technology and knowledge continue to advance and they can't be stopped long term. It's the same issue with the strategy being used to combat the Iranian nuclear program. Hopefully with this delay scientists have had more time to figure out a way to combat the flu if it is going to be more virulent when this strain or one like it gets out.