Bird flu threat is real

Dallas Morning News: If avian flu were to pass into the general population now, the United States, like the rest of the world, would be unready. Experts predict millions could die. Few vaccine production facilities operate in the United States; most of the vaccine Americans could access is made outside the country. In the case of a worldwide health panic, there is no guarantee that nations in which those vaccine plants are located would allow the lifesaving serum to leave the country.
Why is the U.S. capacity to manufacture vaccines -- against seasonal influenza or any number of possible pathogens -- close to nonexistent? Simple economics. Producing vaccines is a high-risk, low-reward enterprise. There is no guarantee that the huge investment necessary for research and development of vaccines is going to pay off, given fluctuating demand.
And because of the breakneck speed at which companies would have to produce a vaccine once a specific health threat is identified, there is practically no time to test the serum adequately for safety. Vaccine makers would open themselves up to liability lawsuits that could destroy their companies.
Vaccine production
The Biodefense and Pandemic Vaccine and Drug Development Act now before Congress would provide market and other incentives to pharmaceutical companies to encourage vaccine production. The most controversial provision would effectively protect vaccine makers against personal injury lawsuits, though it would provide for some compensation in the event of adverse health effects.
Trial lawyers and their Democratic allies are up in arms over the proposal, but unless the U.S. government takes up vaccine manufacturing on its own, the industry's concerns are reasonable and should be accommodated.
We cannot expect to be protected from risk entirely. Americans must decide whether they'd rather run the risk of a vaccine shield that might work badly or take their chances with no shield at all.
After stripping it of a dangerous provision that would exempt a newly created government biomedical agency from the Freedom of Information Act -- thus protecting its workings from necessary public oversight -- Congress should waste little time in passing this legislation.