In 2004, in the wake of anthrax attacks in New York and in Washington, the Congress passed and the President signed into law legislation that was purported to protect the American people from a biological attack.  The law created a special reserve fund that was dedicated to developing medical “countermeasures” to treat symptoms that came from any biological, chemical, radiological or nuclear weapons that might be used by our enemies.

Now, many libertarians might harrumph that the government shouldn’t take such an active role in the biological marketplace, but the fact of the matter is that the risk of a biological attack is fairly low, so the marketplace can’t really support such medical countermeasures without government support.  Also, one of the purposes of government as defined in our constitution is to provide for the common defense, and well, this fits the bill.

The Bio-Shield Act authorized that about five and half billion dollars be spent between 2004 and 2013, and since that time about 2.3 billion dollars have actually been spent.

The program has worked as planned.  Over the last six years, procurement contracts have been reached to find vaccines for anthrax, smallpox, botulinum and others.  Thankfully, we haven’t had to use the program for any emergencies thus far, but then again, I have Fire Insurance, and I haven’t had to use that either.  Read more...