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DOD approves plans for anthrax vacs for troops
Usahog
Member Posts: 18 ✭✭
DOD approves plans for anthrax vaccinations for troops on Korean peninsula, CENTCOM
http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=43793
By Jeff Schogol, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Saturday, February 24, 2007
The Pentagon's top health official has approved each service's plans to resume mandatory anthrax vaccinations for troops on the Korean peninsula and in the U.S. Central Command theater of operations, said Defense Department spokeswoman Cynthia Smith.
It is now up to each service to determine when to resume the mandatory anthrax program, Smith said Thursday.
Dr. William Winkenwerder, assistant secretary of defense for health affairs approved the plans Feb. 8, officials said Thursday.
The vaccinations had been given on a voluntary basis since January 2005, but only about half of U.S. troops opted to get the shots, prompting the Defense Department to announce in 2006 that they would be mandatory for troops deemed most at risk.
But Washington, D.C., lawyer Mark Zaid has vowed to take legal action to prevent the Defense Department from resuming mandatory shots.
Zaid, who represents six Defense Department employees who refused to take the vaccine, plans to file a temporary restraining order in the next two to three weeks, if not sooner, he said in a Thursday e-mail to Stars and Stripes.
Smith declined to say how such a move would affect the Defense Department's plans to make anthrax vaccinations for some troops mandatory again.
"We aren't going to comment on litigation that hasn't even been filed," she said in a Thursday e-mail to Stars and Stripes.
Meanwhile, the Air Force plans to resume its mandatory anthrax vaccination program for some airmen in about three weeks, said Air Force spokeswoman Brenda Campbell on Thursday.
The Air Force has sent its implantation plans to all major commands so that each unit can prepare to vaccinate airmen who rotate to the Korean peninsula and the CENTCOM area of operations, Campbell said.
Army Col. Randall Anderson, director of the Military Vaccine Agency did not give a time line of when soldiers would begin receiving mandatory anthrax vaccinations, saying units and clinics were working to meet each service's plans for mandatory anthrax vaccinations.
"The resumption of the mandatory vaccines will begin when the requirements of each plan are completed by a unit or clinic, mandatory vaccinations for those covered by the policy may begin," Anderson said in an e-mailed response to questions Thursday. "It could have begun in some places."
The Navy could not be reached for comment by deadline on when sailors and Marines will start receiving mandatory anthrax vaccinations.
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The Only Real Known Threat was in Washington D.C. in 2001, how come our elected officials haven't been Manditorly Vaccinated???
Hog
http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=43793
By Jeff Schogol, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Saturday, February 24, 2007
The Pentagon's top health official has approved each service's plans to resume mandatory anthrax vaccinations for troops on the Korean peninsula and in the U.S. Central Command theater of operations, said Defense Department spokeswoman Cynthia Smith.
It is now up to each service to determine when to resume the mandatory anthrax program, Smith said Thursday.
Dr. William Winkenwerder, assistant secretary of defense for health affairs approved the plans Feb. 8, officials said Thursday.
The vaccinations had been given on a voluntary basis since January 2005, but only about half of U.S. troops opted to get the shots, prompting the Defense Department to announce in 2006 that they would be mandatory for troops deemed most at risk.
But Washington, D.C., lawyer Mark Zaid has vowed to take legal action to prevent the Defense Department from resuming mandatory shots.
Zaid, who represents six Defense Department employees who refused to take the vaccine, plans to file a temporary restraining order in the next two to three weeks, if not sooner, he said in a Thursday e-mail to Stars and Stripes.
Smith declined to say how such a move would affect the Defense Department's plans to make anthrax vaccinations for some troops mandatory again.
"We aren't going to comment on litigation that hasn't even been filed," she said in a Thursday e-mail to Stars and Stripes.
Meanwhile, the Air Force plans to resume its mandatory anthrax vaccination program for some airmen in about three weeks, said Air Force spokeswoman Brenda Campbell on Thursday.
The Air Force has sent its implantation plans to all major commands so that each unit can prepare to vaccinate airmen who rotate to the Korean peninsula and the CENTCOM area of operations, Campbell said.
Army Col. Randall Anderson, director of the Military Vaccine Agency did not give a time line of when soldiers would begin receiving mandatory anthrax vaccinations, saying units and clinics were working to meet each service's plans for mandatory anthrax vaccinations.
"The resumption of the mandatory vaccines will begin when the requirements of each plan are completed by a unit or clinic, mandatory vaccinations for those covered by the policy may begin," Anderson said in an e-mailed response to questions Thursday. "It could have begun in some places."
The Navy could not be reached for comment by deadline on when sailors and Marines will start receiving mandatory anthrax vaccinations.
________________________________________________
The Only Real Known Threat was in Washington D.C. in 2001, how come our elected officials haven't been Manditorly Vaccinated???
Hog
Comments
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Congress to Consider Bill to Speed BioShield Program
http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/2007_2_22.html#C91F101D
By Jon Fox
Global Security Newswire
WASHINGTON - U.S. lawmakers have introduced legislation hoping to improve an effort to develop medical countermeasures for WMD attacks (see GSN, Jan. 16).
The bill, introduced in the House this week, is an attempt to address the lagging pace of Project BioShield, a federal effort that has delivered little since it was launched nearly three years ago.
Designed to create an incentive for private enterprise to develop biological countermeasures to unconventional weapons, BioShield dangles cash in front of biotech firms but gives no money until a product is delivered.
Officials at the helm of the $5.6 million program have spent less than 25 percent of their budget, and late last year the Health and Human Services Department abandoned a $1 bullion contract with a California company to provide 75 million doses of an anthrax vaccine (see GSN, Dec. 20, 2006).
President George W. Bush announced the BioShield program during his State of the Union address in 2004, indicating the initiative would counter threats such as the plague and Ebola. To date, however, the program has done little to address these potential biological agents.
BioShield's limited progress has attracted the attention of representatives on the House Homeland Security Committee who have highlighted the program as a focus for oversight and hearings this year.
"I'd just say I'm very concerned with some of the recent problems that have come to light with respect to the BioShield project," Representative James Langevin (D-R.I.) said earlier this month. "For example, we all recently heard about the cancellation of VaxGen's contract for a next generation anthrax vaccine and, at the time, this was the only major procurement contract under BioShield."
Langevin, chairman of the homeland security subcommittee covering emerging threats, is a cosponsor of the new legislation.
Under the current program, the Homeland Security Department first identifies and assesses threats and countermeasures. Once that is completed, the Health and Human Services Department then selects firms to develop specific countermeasures.
The recently introduced bill is designed to accelerate the threat-assessment process. To the extent possible, the Homeland Security Department will be required to clump possible countermeasures into groups that might be able to address more than one chemical, biological or radiological agent.
"Rather than examining each threat individually, we should be looking for ways to properly group these threats together," Langevin said this week. "This legislation will promote a more strategic use of our nation's resources when procuring medical countermeasures."
The bill would also require that homeland security assessments of the most high-risk agents be completed by the end of 2007.
"Effective medical countermeasures for chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear agents are a critical part of our nation's defense against terrorism, yet very few exist," said Representative Mike McCaul (R-Texas), a member of the homeland security subcommittee for emerging threats.
It has never been proved to work. It has killed Americans....the Vaccine that is.
The articles also failed to mention that every DOD Civilian in Korea will have to get the shot or will get fired.
DOD Civilians in Korea are not entitled to Unions or fair labor practices.
any how we had to get it, or they were saying that it would be in direct violation of a General order and UCMJ would get involved. I havent even had a negative counseling statement since i have been in the military so i did not want to kill my record. Mabye i should just Claim that i converted and that any form of medical attention is aginst my religion.