NYT: Government Puts Out Call for Anthrax Vaccine

[DeepModem Mom]

Government Puts Out Call for Anthrax Vaccine
By MATTHEW L. WALD

Published: March 12, 2004


WASHINGTON, March 11 — The Department of Health and Human Services issued an open solicitation on Thursday for enough anthrax vaccine for 25 million people.

The solicitation follows contract awards last September to two biotechnology companies to develop an experimental vaccine. One of those companies, VaxGen Inc., said at the time that the contract, which was for three years, paved the way for a significantly larger contract to develop a national stockpile of the vaccine.

The existence of the government's new request for proposals was first reported in Friday's editions of The Washington Post.

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health, said in a telephone interview on Thursday evening that VaxGen and a British company, Avecia, were still developing the vaccine. They would probably be in a good position to respond to the new request, Dr. Fauci said, but the competition would not be limited to them....

***

The government has announced plans to develop vaccines for a variety of "high priority microbes or toxins," he said, including, in addition to anthrax, botulism toxin, plague, tularemia and hemorrhagic fever including Ebola.


http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/12/politics/12VACC.html


ON EDIT: The fuller Washington Post article, referenced above, is available at this link --

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51691-2004Mar11.html


U.S. to Buy Anthrax Vaccine
Stockpile Would Permit Mass Inoculations

By Justin Gillis
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 12, 2004; Page A01


....Government scientists are still discussing how the anthrax vaccine might be used, and how it compares with other drugs under development, such as artificial antibodies given over the short term to prevent or treat anthrax infection. But the documents released yesterday show the government has decided to order an additional 75 million doses, enough to vaccinate at least 25 million people. Added to the 2 million doses already on order, as much as 9 percent of the country's population would be covered.

The stockpile is projected to cost at least $700 million on top of nearly $200 million already spent, a congressional report said. The two companies involved, VaxGen Inc. of Brisbane, Calif., and Avecia Ltd. of Manchester, England, are racing to scale up their factories for rapid vaccine production.

The most likely use of the vaccine, experts said, would be to inoculate the entire population of a city immediately after a terrorist attack. People might need to take antibiotics for several weeks to prevent disease until the vaccine kicked in, but after that they would be immune even if anthrax spores lingered in the city for years, as the germs are believed capable of doing.

While preventive vaccination of entire cities isn't likely any time soon, said Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, inoculations may be considered for some high-risk occupational groups, including the hazardous-materials teams that would respond to an anthrax attack....

[Florida_Geek]

1. Well the Smallpox program did not teach these people

anything. Just a way to spend YOUR MONEY on drug companies.

[hang a left]

2. This story is very disturbing.

I don't like it one bit. You can just see the groundwork being laid.

[whatelseisnew]

3. Too bad they can't call all those dead micro-biologists