Smallpox Became No-Bid Big-Money Pox -- On The Taxpayer
David Willman writes in the LA Times that the Obama admin has been aggressive about pushing "a $433-million plan to buy an experimental smallpox drug, despite uncertainty over whether it is needed or will work." The company is New York-based Siga Technologies. The company's largest shareholder, Ronald O. Perlman, is a longtime Democratic donor:
When Siga complained that contracting specialists at the Department of Health and Human Services were resisting the company's financial demands, senior officials replaced the government's lead negotiator for the deal, interviews and documents show.When Siga was in danger of losing its grip on the contract a year ago, the officials blocked other firms from competing.
Siga was awarded the final contract in May through a "sole-source" procurement in which it was the only company asked to submit a proposal. The contract calls for Siga to deliver 1.7 million doses of the drug for the nation's biodefense stockpile. The price of approximately $255 per dose is well above what the government's specialists had earlier said was reasonable, according to internal documents and interviews.
Once feared for its grotesque pustules and 30% death rate, smallpox was eradicated worldwide as of 1978 and is known to exist only in the locked freezers of a Russian scientific institute and the U.S. government. There is no credible evidence that any other country or a terrorist group possesses smallpox.
If there were an attack, the government could draw on $1 billion worth of smallpox vaccine it already owns to inoculate the entire U.S. population and quickly treat people exposed to the virus. The vaccine, which costs the government $3 per dose, can reliably prevent death when given within four days of exposure.
Siga's drug, an antiviral pill called ST-246, would be used to treat people who were diagnosed with smallpox too late for the vaccine to help. Yet the new drug cannot be tested for effectiveness in people because of ethical constraints -- and no one knows whether animal testing could prove it would work in humans.
Why am I not surprised that the Treasury is being looted in return for donations to a political party?
Solyndra was so last week. It's only half a billion, just a buck and a half each.
It's not like politicians are getting enough rich trading on insider information. If Wall Street did what Congress does, the prisons would be full.
MarkD at November 14, 2011 9:19 AM
wait, so this is Dubbya's fault right? :verylevellook:
doesn't matter if it's transparent when they are robbing you.
SwissArmyD at November 14, 2011 9:23 AM
This is just a form of money laundering, on a much bigger scale than any other organized crime. The businesses are fronts through which corrupt politicians channel the citizens' money to their rich cronies and themselves. They'll rake in all they can, and when the gravy train ends, as it did for Solyndra, they'll just sell out or shut down and move on to something else.
Politicians and bureaucrats have the power to write and influence legislation and regulations in ways that benefit their rich benefactors. As long as they have that power they will always have rich benefactors.
When politicians no longer have anything to sell, rich people and corporations will no longer have any reason to donate to their campaigns or pay them bribes. There should be a wall of separation between business and government. Let the rich stand or fall on their own.
Ken R at November 14, 2011 8:40 PM
SO, just so I have this right
The governemnt is buying pills
These pills are for a disease which has not been verified in humans for decades
These pills are a secondary protocol for people too stupid to get the original pill in the event of an outbreak
No on has tested these pills
Not on humans(ethical constraints)
Not on animals - no valid reason given, sure its no gaurentee that the results would be the same in humans but you could find out a few things, like major side effects and mortailty rates
Not in the lab - otherwise the article would have played up how well it woked in labs
SO to recap we buying pills that we have no idea if they will work, or how long their shelf life is on the off chance that a widespread outbreak of a disease we erdicated comes back and a bunch of moronic anti vaxers wait until after they are infected to seek help?
Why not just let the morons die?
lujlp at November 16, 2011 6:14 AM
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