The rapid pace of discovery in the life-sciences can have profound implicationsfor public health, and the focus of muchdeliberation in recent years has been onhow best to ensure that they are positiveand not negative. A key focus of debatehas been on dual-use research of con-cern (DURC), which has been defined aslife-science research that“could be directlymisapplied to pose a significant threatwith broad potential consequences to pub-lic health and safety, agricultural crops,and other plants, animals, the environ-ment, materiel, or national security (1).”Debates such as the one that surroundedgain-of-function (GOF) research on avianinfluenza have led to many existentialquestions about contemporary life-scienceresearch, including whether or not suchresearch should even be conducted in thefirst place, what viable alternative exper-imental approaches exist, if or how thefindings should be made public,and how –or whether – such research can be gov-erned (2–6).Responding to these questions at apolicy level necessarily involve a broadersphere of actors than life scientists alone asthey have potential ramifications in differ-ent sectors and for society-at-large. Often,it is the security and research commu-nities that have been at the frontline ofsuch debates and driving policy. The pub-lic health community tends to enter thefray at later stages, such as after the com-pletion of “concerning” research, at whichpoint it is asked to either facilitate discus-sion or comment on the potential publichealth risks and benefits of research (7, 8).By that stage, public health organizationsrisk being viewed of as a partisan supporterof dual-use research (9).In this paper, we demonstrate how thepublic health sector could more substan-tially contribute to the debate, guide pol-icy decisions, and promote actions alongall phases of the research life-cycle. Beforedoing so, we articulate the key aspects ofthe dual-use debate as they are relevant topublic health.