Government scientists have identified the most promising Zika vaccine and have started human trials, but a congressional impasse is forcing them to borrow money intended for crucial work on cancer, diabetes, Ebola and other deadly diseases.
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“A safe and effective vaccine to prevent Zika virus infection and the devastating birth defects it causes is a public health imperative”, NIAID Director Anthony S. Fauci, M.D. said in a statement.
The NIH has asked for $196 million in additional resources for the 2017 fiscal year and BARDA estimates it will need $342 million in additional funding next year to continue to fight Zika. The first phase of that testing is expected to end in late November or December. I worked on legislation that became law in April to add Zika to a Food and Drug Administration program that helps companies get to work developing vaccines faster. The Senate passed a $1.1 billion deal in June, but the House’s approval of its own $1.1 billion in funding was filibustered by Democrats, who argued that they were left out of negotiations on the bill, and that the measure would take funds away from other health programs and bar any availability of funds for birth control.
The federal government is now moving around $81 million that will go toward funding research for a Zika virus vaccine, but a research expert told Action News Jax it isn’t almost enough money for what’s needed to fight the virus.
In her letter, Burwell said that the reallocation is the last internal move the department can make to fund Zika research. It is meant to promote an immune response that would protect against the mosquito-borne virus that can cause devastating birth defects, according to a statement from the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).
Nearly two-thirds of Americans are concerned about the virus spreading across greater swaths of the country in the coming months, according to poll results released Thursday by Suffolk University in Boston.
“Florida has a semitropical climate”, he said.
Public health officials have said small, localised outbreaks are likely in southern U.S. states already vulnerable to mosquito-borne disease.
The state also reported 21 new travel-related infections, with 17 in Broward County, two in Hernando County and one in Miami-Dade and Seminole counties.
Puerto Rico is facing a looming Zika epidemic with 6,475 cases, only 30 of which weren’t locally acquired, according to the CDC.
Zika funding has been caught in a partisan battle since the White House made a $1.9 billion request in February. To date, at least 25 people have been infected by local mosquitoes in South Florida, most in the Wynwood neighborhood of Miami.
Kids returning to school in a Miami neighbourhood linked to Zika infections will be allowed to wear trousers and long-sleeved shirts that don’t match their school uniforms, but still can’t bring mosquito repellent to campus. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) have called on Congress to hold a special session to pass a bill.
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House and Senate Republicans reached a compromise that would spend $1.1 billion on emergency needs. She did not give an amount, but said, “I think they are going to try to do it a piece at a time, hoping that something else will happen”, an apparent reference to the administration’s request that the Republican-led Congress approve a funding bill to combat the virus. “Today’s action is long overdue, and the Obama administration should do even more to find unspent funds that can be redirected toward fighting Zika in Florida”.
