Merrill Goozner of GoozNews has an interesting interview with Richard Ebright, a chemistry professor at Rutgers University. The two discuss the Bruce Ivins, anthrax, and bioterrorism. A few poignant excerpts.
- Ebright: “We’ve spent $57 billion in biodefense since 2001. The annual budget for NIH is only $30 billion. The spending has been disproportionate to the level of threat.”
- Ebright: “There are now 14,000 individuals authorized to handle bioweapons materials.”
Goozner also gets some answers about who benefited from the anthrax attacks of 2001.
- Ebright: “The administration has milked this for all it is worth by allowing the misperception to remain that this was an external attack, possibly from Iraq…The vaccine industry, particularly BioPort and its successors, have exploited this misperception.”