[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 99 (Friday, July 16, 2004)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1399]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[[Page E1399]]
                     PROJECT BIOSHIELD ACT OF 2004

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                               speech of

                            HON. JEFF FLAKE

                               of arizona

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, July 14, 2004

  Mr. FLAKE. Mr. Speaker, today I voted against S. 15, legislation to 
authorize permanent, indefinite funding authority intended to aid the 
procurement of certain biomedical countermeasures (drugs, devices, and 
biological products to treat, identify, and prevent the public health 
consequences of terrorism).
  This legislation is another example of the federal government 
attempting to throw money at a project that is already underway. The 
Departments of Health and Human Services already administer the 
Strategic National Stockpile, which contains drugs, diagnostic devices, 
vaccines, and other biological products to combat the public health 
consequences of a terrorist attack or other public health emergencies. 
The Department of Homeland Security currently provides the financing 
for those efforts, which include the procurement of a new smallpox 
vaccine and stockpiling of that vaccine and older versions of the 
vaccine. About $400 million was appropriated in 2003 for stockpiling 
activities.
  S. 15 takes the unprecedented step of writing a blank check to the 
Administration (both this Administration and future ones) to augment 
the Strategic National Stockpile. While the Congressional Budget Office 
estimates that S. 15 will cost the taxpayers about $5.6 billion over 
the 2004-2013 period, that is only an estimate and the cost could be 
significantly higher.
  Experts have expressed concerns with the structure of Project 
BioShield, saying that it may be focusing on the wrong drugs, with much 
of the spending going to vaccines and drugs that are already fairly 
close to production. Project BioShield is designed to provide 
incentives to pharmaceutical companies to develop new drugs and 
vaccines, but will it actually achieve its intended results? BioShield 
would allow a company to spend several million dollars of its own money 
on developing a new drug or vaccine, only to see the government 
possibly award the contract for producing it to another company. It 
also excludes products that might have a commercial market outside the 
government bioterror stockpile. Concerns have also been raised that 
BioShield does not deal with some important issues like protecting 
companies from liability if products developed under government 
contract have side effects. This bill does not appear to recognize the 
way the free market functions.

  On a larger scale, public-health experts also contend that the focus 
on bioterrorism's threat to the public health is misguided, especially 
when considering the lessons of history. The number of deaths 
attributable to willfully produced epidemics, ever, pales by comparison 
with the toll taken by natural ones. In 1918-19, an influenza pandemic 
killed more people in just 16 months than World War I had killed in six 
years. Smallpox killed 10 times as many people in the first half of the 
20th century, as did both world wars combined. Even today, malaria 
kills 2 million people each year; so does tuberculosis. By contrast, 
deliberate epidemics in the past 100 years, mostly through the actions 
of armies at war, have been responsible for a few thousand deaths.
  In short, Mr. Speaker, this legislation signifies an expenditure of 
extraordinary proportions that may be little more than a public 
relations campaign designed to reassure U.S. citizens that the 
government cares about bioterrorism. I worry about the program's 
effectiveness when it so blatantly ignores the way the market works, 
and I am not comfortable supporting such an expensive bill when too 
many questions about it have gone unanswered.

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