You are watching a movie.
The impeachment distraction is a disgrace.
If we are not fully prepared, the blame lies solely in the democrats laps.
https://docs.house.gov/meetings/IF/IF02/20191204/110278/HHRG-116-IF02-Wstate-KadlecMDMTMHMSR-20191204.pdf
Written Testimony
House Committee on Energy and
Commerce, Subcommittee on Oversight
and Investigations
Flu Season: U.S. Public Health
Preparedness and Response
Statement of
Robert Kadlec, MD, MTM&H, MS
Assistant Secretary For Preparedness and Response
To identify potential gaps in preparedness and, where possible, make improvements, ASPR manages a
robust exercise and evaluation process. Related to pandemic influenza, August 13-16, 2019, ASPR led the
Crimson Contagion 2019 Functional Exercise (Crimson Contagion). Crimson Contagion exercised a
nationwide pandemic influenza response, testing current plans, policies, and procedures, as well as the
nation’s core capability to respond. This exercise was the largest pandemic exercise to date and included 12
Federal departments/agencies, 12 states, 96 local jurisdictions, 24 Native American Tribes, 87 hospitals,
and more than 100 private sector partners. The exercise found that, in the event of a pandemic:
If vaccine development and procurement for medical countermeasures is needed above current
capacity, additional funding would likely be required.
The U.S. lacks sufficient domestic manufacturing capacity and/or raw materials for almost all
pandemic influenza medical countermeasures, including vaccines and therapeutics, the needles and
syringes needed to administer them, and personal protective equipment, including masks, needles,
and syringes. Further, in a pandemic, global manufacturing capacity will likely not be sufficient to meet demand, resulting in an inability to import adequate quantities of medial countermeasures.
To that point, supply chain issues are among the most significant challenges to preparing for an influenza
pandemic as well as other infectious diseases. Today, we are dependent on receipt of active ingredients in
America’s pharmaceutical and over the counter drugs come from China and India; this dependency also
extends beyond pharmaceuticals and includes auxiliary medical supplies such as syringes and gloves3
. This
dramatic shift in the manufacture of medicines is very recent in origin. In the 1990s the U.S., Europe, and
Japan manufactured ninety percent of the global supply of the key ingredients for the world’s medicines
and vitamins. Now, China is the largest global supplier. In a pandemic environment, this dependence could
become a matter of national security, as we witnessed during the H1N1 pandemic of 2009. Countries with
influenza vaccine manufacturing facilities restricted exports to satisfy their domestic requirements first.