Tom Harkin: “One year ago, we were at the beginning of our effort to understand one of the worst public health crises this country…”

“One year ago, we were at the beginning of our effort to understand one of the worst public health crises this country has experienced in recent years. We were just learning about the New England Compounding Center's astonishing disregard for basic procedures to ensure that the products they were manufacturing were sterile. We were shocked and saddened by the news that hundreds were sick and dozens had died from infections caused by NECC's blatant disregard for patient safety, and we were fearful for the fate of the thousands of additional patients who had received injections of NECC products. Despite the urgency of that crisis, the bill we are considering was not slapped together overnight--far from it. It is the product of a full year of careful bipartisan policy collaboration, and it rests upon the factual foundation developed through the bipartisan oversight investigation that Senator Alexander and I launched over 1 year ago. When we learned of the NECC tragedy, we did not rush to pick up a pen and dash off a quick legislative answer. Instead, we sought to understand what that story was, what its causes were, so we could develop legislation which would make a difference in the future and not just make headlines. In early October of 2012, shortly after the outbreak became known, this is what the outbreak looked like. We had these States with 64 deaths and 750 people got sick. I don't mean they just got sick overnight and then got better.…”