Time is of the essence where arming our state against potential biohazards is concerned. It's just too bad we can't turn back the clock about 10 years.

According to experts, that is when we should have begun planning a state-of-the-art biosafety laboratory. Such a lab must be built to standards high enough to contain the most virulent infectious agents such as the virus behind Asia's SARS epidemic or the one triggering the latest scare, the avian flu.

So now we're at a crisis point.

The state response has been encouraging, with the commitment to stockpile antiviral drugs to stem an avian flu outbreak. Given that nationally there's a gap in the ability to manufacture enough of the drugs, it's important to get an early start.

But the need for a lab presents us with a challenge not so easy to meet. Even with a $25 million National Institutes of Health grant in place and state policymakers lined up to approve the needed $12.5 million in matching funds, proponents of a planned new laboratory don't foresee it being operational until 2010. That's because of the extensive environmental assessments and community consultation that must be given the attention they deserve.

In these dangerous times, that's a long interval to leave Hawai'i's isolated population at risk. State lawmakers must redouble efforts to get the funds approved quickly.

The community should continue to be involved in the process as early as possible. There is support for placing the new facility adjacent to the state's own public health lab in Waimano, and this idea makes practical sense. Any detected dangerous virus that arrives in the Islands would make its first stop there anyway, before moving on to the maximum-containment facility. The community would be at no greater risk — and would be safer, in fact — if a dangerous agent could be quickly contained in one stop.

Hawai'i has lost far too much time already in putting these critical safeguards in place.