Lapp& 
- 8 - 
In all of these precautions, no mention is made of the specific 
training and protection of the personnel which would be required 
to ensure the effective operation of the facility. In the final 
section of the NIH appendices which review these issues, a cursory 
reading of the newly uncovered potentials for miscalculation or 
human error is literally hair-raising. 
Even with the genetically impoverished K12 strain, the pos- 
sibility of colonization and transfer of inadvertently ingested 
bacteria are tremendously increased if the personnel have been 
treated with antibiotics, or have diarrhea or any other condition 
23 
which upsets their normal flora. (A staggering 10 microorganisms, 
mostly E. coli, are shed from the gut each day in human feces!) 
Anyone who has achlorhydria, surgical removal of part of the stomach — 
or any other procedure which reduces gastric acidity (even taking 
antacids!) will be at heightened risk for infection with the normally 
acid-sensitive phage particles (lambda phage) which would be likely 
recombinant DNA vectors. In truth, no one knows the probability of 
survival of lambda phage or its likelihood of infection of resident 
E. coll in the human gut — under these or even more normal conditions. 
Naive technicians may not know that cellulose nitrate tubes, 
favorites for centrifugation work, are liable to be converted to 
high explosives when sterilized in an autoclave, or that high-speed 
rotors on centrifuges that are switched from one machine to another 
are more subject to metal fatigue and explosion and disintegration. 
Appendix K — 17 
