06.30.10
Biodefense Industry: Little Scorpions in a Jar
This blog has commented previously on how biodefense industry companies in the US are good at two things: (1) Not bringing products to market; and (2) fighting with each other over government contracts.
The latter of which prop them up.
The latest small chapter is the continued battle between Emergent Biosolutions and PharmAthene (PIP), two Alliance for Biosecurity companies in an acrimonious scrap — one which virtually defines their existence — over anthrax vaccines.
Emergent makes the only anthrax vaccine now used, called BioThrax. It is the company’s only product and its single source of revenue.
It was the vaccine formulation which had its future guaranteed by Bruce E. Ivins anthrax mailings. Ivins’ research was connected with it. And his name, as primary investigator, dominates the scientific literature on it.
The US, under the administration of the Dept. of Health & Human Services and the BARDA granting agency has — since the anthrax mailings — aimed to develop and adopt a follow-on vaccine to BioThrax.
It has issued and withdrawn funds linked to bids.
The most obvious move in this regard had been to award a large contract — $600 million — to PharmAthene for the development of its anthrax vaccine, called SparVax. SparVax was engineered by British scientists for a company called Avecia, bought by Pharmathene on the cheap.
However, the US government withdrew the contract at the end of last year in an apparent vote of no-confidence for PharmAthene’s actual ability to manufacture and deliver it on schedule — within eight years.
However, PharmAthene was awarded another smaller contract — $78 million — apparently to keep development of SparVax open at the end of 2009. Emergent Biosolutions promptly filed a protest which held up PharmAthene’s work and hiring plans for months. The smaller contract has been written of in the press and on blogs as the result of inside business dealing between PharmAthene’s lobby, dead Congressman Jack Murtha and the US government.
And now HH&S will solicit a a third round of proposals for a new anthrax vaccine.
All things considered, the history of anthrax vaccine making post-9/11, seen within the context of the large biodefense industry boom, has been a sorry one. With no sign of change any time soon.
It can be summarized thusly: No products, no vaccines, plus lots of warning of dire consequences if taxpayer funding isn’t always accelerated or expanded.
The latest round of fighting between PharmAthene and Emergent Biosolutions spilled into the open in the pages of the Wall Street Journal on Monday.
A lobbyist for Emergent called PharmAthene “a virtual company run by a bunch of political hacks” operated “out of a warehouse.”
PharmAthene also has an unsuccessful antidote to nerve gas poisoning called Protexia.
Reads a PharmAthene press release from 2005:
“The acquisition of Protexia(TM) further strengthens our biological and chemical defense product portfolio. This will allow PharmAthene to play a major role in preparing the United States for a potential biological or chemical terrorist attack,” said David P. Wright, President & CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. of PharmAthene. “With the completion of preclinical development, human clinical safety trials and manufacturing scale-up of Protexia(TM), the U.S. Government will have the option to procure for the Strategic National Stockpile an effective antidote for chemical nerve agents.
Protexia is allegedly ‘made’ by isolation from milk of transgenic goats and PharmAthene had issued press releases on its efficacy in vivo — or on lab tests on animals.
Emergent’s lobbyist also took a shot — a funny one — at Protexia development, saying “Ask them about the dead goats.” For the Journal, a PharmAthene official conceded goats had bought the farm, although it was alleged to be a business decision that they should die.
Most recently, PharmAthene hired an official from Health & Human Services to be its chief scientific officer. The official had been involved in acquisition of anthrax and smallpox vaccines, a position of oversight.
The hiring immediately reinforced the perception of cozy dealing and conflicts-of-interest for the benefit of the biodefense industry.
The Washington Times reported on the matter, thusly:
When the publicly traded biodefense company PharmAthene Inc. hired Thomas R. Fuerst as its chief scientific officer in April, executives publicized his work as a senior official in the federal government leading the development and acquisition of vaccines and other products against pandemic flu, smallpox and anthrax.
Mr. Fuerst was appointed shortly after his departure from the Department of Health and Human Services at a time when the Annapolis, Md.-based company was trying hard to sell a new anthrax vaccine to the government, highlighting the so-called “revolving door” in which former senior federal officials land jobs in industries with which they interacted while serving in the government.
Though President Obama enacted new revolving-door ethics rules soon after taking office requiring a two-year “cooling off” period for appointees leaving the government, those regulations apply only to incoming appointees – not to career federal employees such as Mr. Fuerst. He holds a doctoral degree in molecular genetics.
“It looks like Dr. Fuerst walked the ethics tightrope,” said Scott Amey, general counsel for the nonpartisan watchdog group Project On Government Oversight.
Previously — on the biodefense industry and anthrax vaccine making.
Todd Moschner said,
June 30, 2010 at 12:44 pm
Tsk Tsk Dick – Hate to call you out again but it sure seems like you’re just a front for Emergent. You really read the WSJ and thought PharmAthene is the worse actor? You cite the WTimes piece on Fuerst but did you look at EBS’s board ala Jerome Hauer? He too worked for HHS, left gov, went on EBS’s board and he and his wife have a paid consulting contract w/ EBS still today. Explain the difference? And to be fair to both Hauer and Fuerst – neither lobby so the spirit of the revolving door doesn’t necessarily apply except when EBS is planting a piece to slam a competitor in a right-wing pub.
As for EBS’s spokesman you cite about political hacks – again Dick I’m sure you did your homework. Shofe came from the Minn. GOP and the Tobacco Institute – it’s right in his bio on their website. EBS’s comm. dir. was a McCain campaign aide. And VP Hecht is a relative of one of the most prominent tobacco and foreign country lobbyists in DC. What does PharmAthene have? Wright and Richman came from biotechs. And one of their board members worked for Jimmy Carter. At best you can call that a draw Dick.
Oh and Dick, did you find the stories about how EBS was started as a political payoff from Clinton to Admiral Crowe for endorsing him in ’92. Crowe and the El Hibri family were friends/partner on the deal. No political hackery there Dick.
You have every right to source recent news. But really, how about some insight/analysis that isn’t so slanted since you claim to be concerned about our country. You should surely support all the companies that are doing good work to try and help keep our nation safe – but do you really want to aid one company at the expense of others when the facts aren’t as one sided as they appear???
George Smith said,
June 30, 2010 at 1:49 pm
Tsk tsk Todd, seems you’re just a salve for PharmAthene. You show up when the company name shows up in any new post, screaming imbalance when the post’s title casts bad light on both.
You should surely support all the companies that are doing good work to try and help keep our nation safe.
You employed this the last time, too: The keep-the-nation-safe shtick.
Here’s the nut of it, your poor argument and ignoring a larger issue. So how long now have Alliance for Biosecurity, or biodefense industry firms in general, been not producing anything but always asking for and getting more funding?
Then you build on the idea that because this post — or any subsequent post doesn’t include all the old nasty news from, say, David Willman’s 2007 coverage on Emergent and its predatory way of doing business, it’s unfair.
As for some random example re Emergent, I’ll repost this from a much older blog entry, concerning mischief with another company and their vaccine business, which is flu. But you probably missed it.
“In an order signed on Sept. 18, in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware in Wilmington, Judge Brendan Linehan Shannon granted the request of the Meriden, Conn.-based biopharmaceutical company [Protein Sciences} to dismiss the involuntary bankruptcy case that was filed against it by three of its creditors,” reported The Daily Deal on September 21.
“The bankruptcy took us away from our mission, which is to save lives,” said Dan Adams, CEO of Protein Sciences, to the Deal. “Adams has expressed confidence that the case would be dismissed since the creditor group filed the involuntary Chapter 7 petition on June 22.”
“Protein Sciences on July 13 filed a response with the Delaware court, asserting that the bankruptcy filing was done in bad faith, and solely as a tool for Emergent Manufacturing to acquire its assets … On May 27, 2008, Emergent’s parent, Emergent BioSolutions Inc., announced that it had agreed to acquire Protein Sciences in a deal worth $78 million. However, according to Adams, the deal was halted because of shareholder opposition. ‘Instead of making another offer, [Emergent] came back and shot us,’ Adams said.”
but do you really want to aid one company at the expense of others when the facts aren’t as one sided as they appear???
You draw out the thread of talk finer than the staple of the argument.