WASHINGTON — President Obama’s contingency plan to help finance production of a swine-flu vaccine with funds set aside to develop defenses against biological attacks would weaken the nation’s preparedness for terrorism, the leaders of a bipartisan commission on weapons of mass destruction said Sunday.
The White House asked Congress on Tuesday for authority to spend up to $9 billion more for an H1N1 flu vaccine and other preparations against the novel flu strain that first appeared in April.
“Using BioShield funds for flu preparedness will severely diminish the nation’s efforts to prepare for WMD events and will leave the nation less, not more, prepared,” the commission’s chairman, former Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., and vice chairman, former Sen. James Talent, R-Mo., wrote in letters sent to Obama and his budget director, Peter Orszag.
