WPpg1: No Hope for New Anthrax Vaccine Stockpile by Nov. (another failure)

No Hope for Stockpile of New Anthrax Vaccine by November
Developer Seeks Extension After Setback on Crucial Test
By Justin Gillis
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 17, 2006; Page A01


The government's $1 billion effort to develop a new anthrax vaccine has run into difficulty, with the company in charge of the project reporting failure in a major human test and falling at least a year behind schedule.

Officers at VaxGen Inc. of Brisbane, Calif., said in interviews that they believe they have isolated the problem with their vaccine and are well on their way to fixing it....The difficulties appear to confirm predictions on Capitol Hill two years ago that a small company like VaxGen wouldn't be able to meet an aggressive schedule for stockpiling millions of doses of a new anthrax vaccine. Until the full stockpile of 75 million doses is ready, the United States would depend on antibiotics to treat a large-scale anthrax attack, a strategy that terrorists could overcome by creating antibiotic-resistant anthrax.

Administrators at the Health and Human Services Department declined to discuss specifics of the VaxGen contract. But they said that, despite some setbacks, they are building a national defense against anthrax spores, among the most fearsome of bioterror weapons. In particular, they noted, they have already stockpiled enough antibiotics to treat 40 million people after a large-scale attack....

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With the VaxGen product delayed, the government recently bought 5 million doses of an older, controversial anthrax vaccine, enough to treat fewer than 2 million people, and hopes to order more when funds are identified.

The anthrax program is emblematic of larger problems in Project BioShield, President Bush's ambitious biowarfare defense program. It's becoming clear that many of the robust national safeguards against biological and radiological terrorism that Bush promised when he got Congress to create BioShield simply won't be ready any time soon. HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt told Congress yesterday that "more can and must be done to aggressively and efficiently implement Project BioShield," and he pledged to reorganize the responsible office....


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/16/AR2006031602285.html

which use eggs as a medium.

on plastic and duct tape

and the free press... remember?