News & Perspective

(CIDRAP News) – Federal health officials project that about half of the estimated 10 million health and emergency response workers targeted for the second round of smallpox vaccinations will refuse the shots.

(CIDRAP News) – President Bush tomorrow will announce a plan to begin vaccinating military personnel and front-line healthcare workers against smallpox early next year and to offer the vaccine to the public in 2004, according to reports from major news organizations today.

(CIDRAP News) – As the likelihood of a large-scale smallpox vaccination program grows, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is seeking to expand the government's limited supply of vaccinia immune globulin (VIG), the mainstay of treatment for severe reactions to the vaccine.

(CIDRAP News) – In passing a bill to create a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) this week, Congress left the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in charge of most bioterrorism preparedness and civilian biodefense research programs—to the relief of medical research and public health groups.

(CIDRAP News) – Now that the federal government has some licensed smallpox vaccine in its stockpile, a presidential announcement on vaccination recommendations may be coming very soon, bioterrorism expert Michael T. Osterholm, PhD, MPH, predicted last week.

"I believe that in the next days you'll be hearing from the president about this vaccine," Osterholm told healthcare workers at a meeting in Minneapolis.

(CIDRAP News) – The Pentagon's mandatory anthrax shots caused adverse reactions in most recipients and helped prompt many Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard members to transfer to other units or leave the military between 1998 and 2000, according to a survey by Congress's General Accounting Office (GAO).

(CIDRAP News) – The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has updated the licensing for the government's decades-old stockpile of Dryvax smallpox vaccine by approving a new vaccine kit that includes a new diluent and bifurcated needles, according to federal officials.

(CIDRAP News) – The Department of Defense's (DoD's) vaccine acquisition program is poorly organized and underfunded, making it difficult for the department to obtain important vaccines and maintain the supply of existing ones, according to a new report from the Institute of Medicine (IOM).

(CIDRAP News) – Researchers at Rockefeller University report that they have isolated an enzyme from a bacteriophage that shows promise as a tool to quickly detect and kill Bacillus anthracis, the anthrax bacterium.

July 1, 2002 (CIDRAP News) – About half of the nation's supply of anthrax vaccine—previously dedicated almost entirely to military use—will henceforward be set aside for civilian use in the event of another anthrax attack, federal defense and health officials announced Jun 28.