How much more secure can you get ...

... than a damn island? Moving the research performed on Plum Island onto the mainland is, IMO, a big mistake. This one blurb highlights why:

And in 1978, a foot-and-mouth outbreak occurred among animals in pens outside the laboratory.

Yes, and they were contained to the island. If that happened in Kansas, forget it ... you now have foot-and-mouth disease in the United States. The last outbreak in the US occured in ... 1914. To clear up that mess, it cost us 4.5 million. I'm not even going to bother converting that to today's dollar equivalent. It's one of the reasons foot-and-mouth disease is done on Plum Island, and not on the mainland. I hope I don't sit here years from now and blog "Told ya so, ya idiots."