In the context of the microbiological and biomedical laboratories, the assessment of risk focuses primarily on the prevention of laboratory-associated infections. When addressing laboratory activities involving infectious or potentially infectious material, risk assessment is a critical and productive exercise. The intent of this section is to provide guidance and to establish a framework for selecting the appropriate biosafety level.
Risk assessment can be qualitative or quantitative.
Types, subtypes, and variants of infectious agents involving different or unusual vectors, the difficulty of assays to measure an agent's amplification potential, and the unique considerations of genetic recombinants are but a few of the challenges to the safe conduct of laboratory work. In the face of such complexity, meaningful quantitative sampling methods are frequently unavailable. Therefore, the process of doing a risk assessment for work with biohazardous materials cannot depend on a prescribed algorithm. The laboratory director or principal investigator is responsible for assessing risks in order to set the biosafety level for the work. In performing a qualitative risk assessment, all the risk factors are first identified and explored.