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New Biodefense R&D Agency Created

Mike Mitka

JAMA. 2007;297:575-576.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

In 2004, the US federal government created Project Bioshield, a $5.6 billion program intended to spur researchers and companies to create vaccines and drugs to protect individuals in the United States from bioterror agents such as anthrax, smallpox, botulism, and bubonic plague.

It did not work.

To date, no new vaccines or drugs have been produced. Indeed, Project Bioshield's largest contract, $877.5 million to VaxGen Inc, Brisbane, Calif, for 75 million doses of anthrax vaccine, was cancelled on December 19 by the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). VaxGen failed to meet certain production milestones as the company struggled to perfect its product.

But new legislation signed into law by President George W. Bush on the same day VaxGen lost its contract has vaccine and drug developers cautiously optimistic that flaws in the original Project Bioshield legislation have been corrected, easing the way to a more fruitful . . . [Full Text of this Article]

A NEW AGENCY