RS21507
Project BioShield
August 25, 2003
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Summary
Many potential biological terrorism agents lack available countermeasures. President Bush proposed Project BioShield to encourage companies to develop new bioterror countermeasures. The main provisions of that proposal include: (1) relaxing procedures for bioterrorism-related procurement and peer review; (2) guaranteeing a market through contract authority granted to the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) to buy countermeasures following Presidential approval, funded by a permanent, indefinite appropriation; and (3) allowing the HHS Secretary to permit the emergency use of unapproved countermeasures. S. 15 (Gregg) incorporates these proposals. H.R. 2122 (Tauzin) and S. 1504 (Gregg) are similar to S. 15. The largest difference is rather than creating a permanent, indefinite appropriation, H.R. 2122 and S. 1504 authorize the appropriation of up to $5.593 billion for the purchase of countermeasures through FY2013. H.R. 2122 creates a special reserve fund for these appropriations while S. 1504 does not. Some provisions of Project BioShield are controversial. Some critics suggest that biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies will require even more incentives than contained in these proposals. Additional incentives being considered by the 108th Congress include protection from litigation because of adverse reactions to the countermeasures, and tax and intellectual property incentives (S. 666, Lieberman). Other options include directly funding development or increasing the scope of existing federal programs designed to encourage technology commercialization. This report will be updated in response to legislative developments.
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Related Legislation:
- S.15
- H.R.2122
- S.1504
- S.666
