# CFIA scientists caught trying to sneak pathogens to China.



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Obviously money was involved here...but what is the purpose of a gov't employed Canadian Food Inspection Agency sneaking several vial of a dangerous and contagious pathogen
apprehended on his way to the airport to China. This is almost the fodder for another sequel to "Snakes on a plane" movie...."Bacteria loose in a plane"
Imagine if one of those brucellosis vials had broke inside the plane and infected all the passengers through the planes air supply?

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/s...hogens-cfia-researchers-charged-brucella.html

Now here is the real question..what is our Food Inspection Agency doing with contagious pathogens? Aren't they supposed to protect our food supply from deadly bacteria? 
Or are these bacteria some kind of weird research project that is sanctioned by the gov't and the Chinese want to get their hands on it to....???

Now the other interesting question..with airport security so tight, it would have been detected during the passenger security scan...unless he packed them in his suitcase,
and the way airport baggage handlers toss our bags around, that could have resulted in an accident waiting to happen.


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## Sampson (Apr 3, 2009)

carverman said:


> Now here is the real question..what is our Food Inspection Agency doing with contagious pathogens? Aren't they supposed to protect our food supply from deadly bacteria?


How can they protect us if they don't have the means to study the agents?

The Federal government, via the CFIA, PHAC, NML, and other agencies/institutions often do phenomenal research into not only developing diagnostic tools for detection, but also treatments, as well as elements of basic research.

If the Feds don't do this research, no one would, well, self-serving Big Pharma would.

Brucella isn't particularly nasty, nor difficult to obtain. I suspect what these individuals were smuggling had more to do with making money and self-profit, i.e. they performed studies while at the CFIA that they could not claim as their own IP, and therefore tried to strike a deal in China.

No indications for 'bio-terrorism' and Brucella would be a terrible choice anyway.


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Sampson said:


> How can they protect us if they don't have the means to study the agents?
> 
> 
> Brucella isn't particularly nasty, nor difficult to obtain. I suspect what these individuals were smuggling had more to do with making money and self-profit, i.e. they performed studies while at the CFIA that they could not claim as their own IP, and therefore tried to strike a deal in China.
> ...


Brucella would cause brucellosis in cattle, which is a contagious pathogen. It was also used in a biological warfare experiement (see Biological Warfare sub paragraph) below..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brucellosis

Now the question is: even if the Chinese approached these biological scientists and offered them big money to do some research for them..what was the intent here..
coming up with fast detection methods of brucellosis strains in their cattle/animals.... or some other sinister purpose?

If it was for pure research to protect their food supplies derived from animal sources, you would think that the Chinese gov't would have other more diplomatic methods of having
test specimens shipped from Canada. 
Just like the Navy Sub Lieutanant that got convicted of selling information to the Russians, this appears to be a similar situation.
One of the former CFIA scientists was already over in China..did he quit CFIA, get layed off or get fired? 

Maybe the trial will reveal more information why two scientists employed by our gov't should be going over there in the first place without proper clearance
by all the concerned Canadian agencies.


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## Beaver101 (Nov 14, 2011)

> * Carverman: Obviously money was involved here...*but what is the purpose of a gov't employed Canadian Food Inspection Agency sneaking several vial of a dangerous and contagious pathogen
> apprehended on his way to the airport to China. This is almost the fodder for another sequel to "Snakes on a plane" movie...."Bacteria loose in a plane"
> Imagine if one of those brucellosis vials had broke inside the plane and infected all the passengers through the planes air supply?
> 
> ...


This just goes to prove a few things: 

1. Canadian scientists now consider themselves to be inadequately paid so they need to resort to other means of compensation (even it's stealing bio-hazards :eek2.
2. Are these "scientists" ever-so-bright so as to carry the pathogens with them :stupid: (never mind not considering what happens to everyone else who gets exposed).
3. Is security lax at the labs of FIA - too many happy hours there. :rolleyes2:
4. Spying, hacking, inside-dealings, kick-backs, etc. have gone amok at these gov't owned institutions - something new happens everyday. :greedy_dollars:


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## Koala (Jan 27, 2012)

One of them was involved in developing a quick detection test. It's hard to develop a test if you don't have the organism, so that at least explains why they had it.


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Beaver101 said:


> This just goes to prove a few things:
> 
> 1. Canadian scientists now consider themselves to be inadequately paid so they need to resort to other means of compensation (even it's stealing bio-hazards :eek2.


maybe..or maybe they are not appreciated/recognized for the work they do? Of course now, they will be recognized and may end up spending some time in prison. 



> 2. Are these "scientists" ever-so-bright so as to carry the pathogens with them :stupid: (never mind not considering what happens to everyone else who gets exposed).


If the vials were in a foam lined attache case, the case would have been examined at airport security and he would have been caught there, but he was caught on the way
to the airport (in his car?) and probably he had concealed the vials inside his checked luggage, which wouldn't necessarily be xrayed..but possibly randomly checked for drugs
by trained dogs. (They now have dogs that can sniff out large caches of money being laundered out of the country.)


> 3. Is security lax at the labs of FIA - too many happy hours there. :rolleyes2:


obviously more lax than at the Mint. Maybe now after this incident, there will be more security to remove those vials from where ever they were keeping them in storage.
It always takes an incident like this to have security tightened up.



> 4. Spying, hacking, inside-dealings, kick-backs, etc. have gone amok at these gov't owned institutions - something new happens everyday. :greedy_dollars:


It seems to be happening a lot these days inside the gov't. Recently a hard disk was unconvered that contains the names of individuals and where they have stashed their
money in foreign accts to avoid paying tax. A senator's husband (so it would be female senator) has been accused of hiding 1.7 million in an offshore tax haven.
Greed is rampant everywhere it seems...not only are we generating our home grown terrorists now..but who can still be trusted to do their job as they are supposed to?
Look at what's going on in Quebec with the mayors and company officials being brought up on charges. I guess we can say.."welcome to the 21st century in Canada'.


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## Sampson (Apr 3, 2009)

Carve, do you know how much money there is in infectious animal research. Typically 30-50% of revenue of the big Pharma (think Pfizer and Novartis) comes from animal health products. $$$

I know many research scientists that work in the CFIA, to suggest that there is a government plot to exploit infectious pathogens is a little amibitious.

The problem I have with your logic is that Brucella is prevalent and quite easily collected from natural settings (live stock) and in humans, quite easily treated (antibiotics). It is not highly pathogenic, does not cause the most severe reactions in immunocompetent individuals. - hence a very poor pathogen for your suggested nefarious purposes.

Scientists, at least full-scientists at the CFIA are actually compensated very well, relatively speaking, much higher than average salaries in this country. I really suspect that this will be a case of a disgruntled individual, perhaps having come upon a nice potentially profitable discovery, that unlike at a research University, this fella could not exploit due to the restrictions and confines of the CFIA and Federal research lab environment. OR he was in love or desperate.

One more possibility, he was tired of being muzzled?!?


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Sampson said:


> Scientists, at least full-scientists at the CFIA are actually compensated very well, relatively speaking, much higher than average salaries in this country. I really suspect that *this will be a case of a disgruntled individual, perhaps having come upon a nice potentially profitable discovery,* that unlike at a research University, this fella could not exploit due to the restrictions and confines of the CFIA and Federal research lab environment. OR *he was in love or desperate*.
> 
> One more possibility, he was tired of being muzzled?!?


Sampson: I like your way of thinking. :encouragement: Apparently this case happened a few months ago and has just come to light. There are (or were) 2 CFIA bio-scientists involved,
I believe. One was of Chinese origin and went over to China first. Yu, (a female scientist) of Ottawa.


> Yu, Nielsen co-authored journal paper in 2010
> We believe Ms. Yu is currently in China," Rollings added. A Canada-wide arrest warrant has been issued for Yu.
> 
> While the investigation did not begin until 2011, the breach of trust charge dates back to Sept. 9, 2005, according to Rollings.


So..there is not enough facts here obviously to determine the real reason behind Mr. Nielson's "defection with the pathogens" , but you may be correct in stating that the pathogen
is not as serious to human health as to cattle.
Obviously, more light may be shed on this as the trial comes up...He and Ms. Yu did work together on their project and paper, so maybe...there was a love interest there, but
then, if there was, why would he not just quit outright and defect to China to be with his love interest?...hmmmmm? Something just doesn't add up?

Even if there were strict export rules on pathogens to other countries..and I can see that as a obvious reason, what would possess him to grab a bunch of vials out of the
fridge at work and make a run for the airport?

Somebody in China (a research establishment..either university or a military research facility) was interested enough for him to drop what he was doing at CFIA, grab a bunch
of vials and try to make a run to the airport..but he was already being investigated for breach of trust months before and got apprehended on the way to the airport.

There is no conclusion based on the facts so far, but I find this incident very interesting...
that is a research scientist not of Chinese origin, running off to China with a restricted substance.


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