Posted on 03/28/2002 6:19:58 AM PST by Tumbleweed_Connection
Up to 90 million doses of smallpox vaccine have been discovered in a U.S.-based storage facility run by a French pharmaceutical company, in a find that instantly increases the nation's ability to combat the deadly disease six-fold.
The vaccine stockpile, reported by the Washington Post Thursday, was produced by Aventis Pasteur of Lyon, France, which has its U.S. operations in Swiftwater, Pennsylvania.
"It's a great insurance policy," D.A. Henderson, director of the newly created federal Office of Health Preparedness, told the Post.
The tens of millions of doses of the anti-smallpox agent were reportedly manufactured decades ago, but it was not clear who made the discovery or why it had been forgotten about.
A smallpox emergency preparedness drill conducted last year, dubbed "Dark Winter" by U.S. authorities, found that the nation was woefully unprepared for a smallpox attack, with a just a 12 million doses of the vaccine on hand at the time.
Last fall Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson pledged to boost smallpox vaccine stockpiles, but the project was expected to take years.
Shelf life?
A smallpox emergency preparedness drill conducted last year, dubbed "Dark Winter" by U.S. authorities, found that the nation was woefully unprepared for a smallpox attack, with a just a 12 million doses of the vaccine on hand at the time.
The absolute quantity of vaccine may be "only" sixfold more, but the possibility of controling a manmade epidemic is increased more than that. If we had no vaccine, we would be 100% vulnerable to such attack, and if we had (and used) one dose per person here we would be 0% vulnerable. 100 million doses held in reserve against need provides a substantial insurance policy against severe contaigion.
The questions which arise are, first, shelf-life and second, ownership. If this stuff is good, we should buy it. Those who stored it deserve ample compensation--like, however much it would cost us to tool up and make that much protection now. Not what it cost then, and not what it cost to store since its creation. But its replacement cost, plus a fee--which might also reflect the fact that it was actually available all this time, and would have been found if we had needed it. Insurance fee . . .
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