washingtonpost.com
Stockpiling Waste
No new anthrax vaccine anytime soon
Sunday, January 14, 2007; Page B06
STOCKPILING a new anthrax vaccine was supposed to be the signal achievement of Project Bioshield, the government's flagship program to prepare for a biological, chemical or radiological attack on American soil. But last month the Department of Health and Human Services canceled its contract with VaxGen, a biotechnology firm that was supposed to develop the vaccine. The contract turned out to be a huge waste of time and effort.
There were signs that Bioshield was far, far off track long before VaxGen lost its contract. HHS tapped VaxGen for its $1 billion anthrax vaccine contract even though the company was best known for producing a failed AIDS medication, had never created a successful drug and had failed to release satisfactory financial reports, leading to its delisting from the Nasdaq Stock Market. The company repeatedly ran afoul of the Food and Drug Administration, which pulled the plug on human trials for the vaccine.
Nevertheless, accompanied by a drumbeat of bad news about the company's progress, federal contracting officials extended VaxGen's due dates. Now HHS officials insist that VaxGen offered convincing evidence that it could produce a new anthrax vaccine on time when it signed its contract in 2004. It would be more reassuring if those officials admitted mistakes and said that they were trying to figure out where they had gone wrong.
Concern over the $5.6 billion Project Bioshield prompted recent passage of a law that creates a much-needed coordinating office to oversee Bioshield's varied efforts and alters the way the federal government funds anti-bioterrorism research. Its backers claim that these changes will foster effective partnerships between government and industry that can head off disasters such as VaxGen.
Perhaps they will, but Project Bioshield might need a more fundamental reexamination. For example, Bioshield's priorities: Rather than stockpiling a particular vaccine, might it be more effective to redirect much of that money to measures that would help across a range of disasters, such as buying face masks and respirators or enhancing drug production capacity? |
