Public health officials said Congress had missed an opportunity by excising nearly $900 million in proposed financing for pandemic flu preparation from this year's stimulus bill.
When it comes to both flu and finance, most of us – if not all – are adrift in turbulent, unpredictable waters.
They recently issued a new policy that will require all federally financed experiments with bird flu and other worrisome pathogens to be evaluated for risks and benefits before they start.
Within two weeks of his purchase of the biotech stock that Feb. 22, Mr. Obama initiated what he has called "one of my top priorities since arriving in the Senate," a push to increase federal financing to fight avian flu.
During negotiations on the stimulus package, both Democrats and Republicans agreed that pandemic flu research financing, though very worthwhile, did not meet the test of stimulus spending and instead should go through the regular appropriations process.
The White House asked Congress on Tuesday to provide $1.5 billion in emergency financing to battle the swine flu outbreak, but it is not clear how that money might flow downstream.
A $320,000 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation financed the "Vote and Vax" flu shot drives in Houston and 24 other American cities, according to the foundation, a health advocacy organization.
Agustín Carstens, the finance minister, said that the swine-flu outbreak will lop an extra 0.3% from GDP this year.
Activity merely shifts from one period to the next.That was the conclusion of a 2006 report* by the Canadian finance ministry, when bird, rather than swine, flu was the concern.
In the six weeks up to November 24th, 70 finance firms in Britain simulated a five-month-long flu pandemic which at its peak meant almost half the workforce was absent.
