Bioterrorism Prevention, a Super Budget Program

More than five years after the Sept. 11 attacks, the government cannot show how the $5 billion given to public health departments has better prepared the country for a bioterrorism attack or flu pandemic.
Congress responded to the 2001 strikes and anthrax-tainted letters sent to lawmakers by putting much more money toward emergency preparedness. State health departments typically get tens of millions of dollars per year to prepare for bioterrorism; it was in the hundreds of thousands before Sept. 11.
Washington had to set criteria to evaluate how well the dollars were spent. That assignment fell to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has struggled with the task.
The government began awarding money for bioterrorism preparedness in 1999, sending $40.7 million to the states. In 2002, the total jumped to $950 million. That is about one-quarter of what the U.S. spends each year on bioterrorism and emergency preparedness — not counting the money for preventing a pandemic.
Health departments used federal grants to stock up on antivirals, buy needles and syringes, and hire more doctors and nurses. One of the most important upgrades came in disease surveillance.