The Plum Island Animal Disease Center(PIADC) is a United States federal research facility dedicated to the study of foreign animal diseases. Since 1954, the center has had the goal of protecting America's livestock from foreign animal diseases. During the Cold War a secret biological weapons program targeting livestock was conducted at the site. This program has been the subject of controversies, and the facility has gained a cult status.
As a diagnostic facility, PIADC scientists study more than 40 foreign animal diseases and several domestic diseases, including hog cholera and African swine fever.PIADC runs about 30,000 diagnostic tests each year. PIADC operates Biosafety Level 3 Agriculture (BSL-3Ag), BSL-3 and BSL-2 laboratory facilities. The facility's research program includes developing diagnostic tools and preventatives (such as vaccines) for foot-and-mouth disease and other diseases of livestock.Plum Island's freezers also contain samples of polio and diseases that can be transferred from animals to humans.
Because Congressional law stipulates that live foot-and-mouth disease virus cannot be studied on the mainland, PIADC is unique in that it is currently the only laboratory in the U.S. equipped with research facilities that permit the study of foot-and-mouth disease
Foot-and-mouth disease is extremely contagious among cloven-hoofed animals, and people who have come in contact with it can carry it to animals.Accidental outbreaks of the virus have caused catastrophic livestock and economic losses in many countries throughout the world. Plum Island has experienced outbreaks of its own, including one in 1978 in which the disease was released to animals outside the center, and two incidents in 2004 in which foot and mouth disease was released within the center.Foot-and-mouth disease was eradicated from the U.S. in 1929 (with the exception of the stocks within the Plum Island centerbut is currently endemic to many parts of the world.
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