BARDA to establish countermeasures centers

HHS's Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) will invest about $400 million to establish three private-public consortia to develop and manufacture medical countermeasures. Each consortium will retrofit existing facilities or build new facilities that will use cell and recombinant-based vaccine technologies to develop countermeasures for pandemic influenza and other threats. HHS expects the facilities to become operational in 2014-15 with the combined capability to produce a quarter of the country's pandemic influenza vaccine within four months of a pandemic. Private partners will contribute about 35% of the total costs in the initial building phase, while HHS will support operation and maintenance costs in subsequent years. ...