Tom Harkin

I think the plan is a good plan, from what I've been able to read about it and to take a look at it.

For all that we put on their plate.

I'm just thinking out loud here--is it FDA, or do we need to take something out of the FDA?

We have to sort of think about what are the priority areas, knowing full well that we can't guarantee absolute, 100-percent protection against anything.

Thank you again, Dr. Pavia.

Funding provided by this subcommittee is what pays for the Nation's medical countermeasures (MCM), including the drugs, medicines, and devices that protect Americans against bioterrorism, pandemic influenza, and other emerging infections.

I'm concerned, because this subcommittee put a lot of money--$15 billion through this subcommittee, since fiscal year 2006--for pandemic preparedness activities.

The fact that we were using 60-year-old technologies to make important vaccines like H1N1 was one of the reasons that Senator Graham and Talent and the commissioners gave that 'F'.

I don't understand how this fund--the Strategic Investor Fund----would work different from BARDA.

Future attacks remain a very real threat. Yet, we are still using the same anthrax vaccine that was developed 40 years ago.

Now, that's a good idea. I like that.

I just think we're relying too much on the FDA.

And thank all of you for your testimonies, and for your work in this field, and your leadership in this field.

We know flu is here... we know there are a lot of other strains of flu out there.

It's got great bipartisan support. It's being held up a little bit, but it's going to pass.

I'd like to start thinking about it now, and looking at it.

I mean, it's just--it's just very difficult to do that, okay? It's just difficult.

The funding you're going to approve now is what kind of defense my kids and grandkids are going to have 5, 10 years from now, sir.

Is anthrax the major threat that we have that we should be worried about with regard to bioterrorism?

I'm not going to sign off on it. That's $200 million.

Despite all those improvements, a continuing vulnerability is our dependence on egg-based technology to produce influenza vaccines.

What we can do, if we properly fund these programs, and manage them, Mr. Chairman, vice chairman, we can push the decimal point to the left, is how Senator Graham describes it.

It's sometimes said that, while the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee defends America, this subcommittee actually defines America.

I don't know how anybody can argue with this bill. It just says, one, we are going to end subsidies for plant closing costs. In other words, right now, a company could close a plant here and move it overseas. All of the costs of closing…

Well, I agree we are not getting to the nub of it, but it is a good step forward. I mean, sometimes you do have to treat the symptoms before you can get to the underlying cause. I am not a doctor. I don't want to practice medicine without…