Report calls for transparent bio-attack funding.

The effort to protect the United States from biological attacks has received considerable attention and money from the federal government, but those funds could be much better applied, according to a report by the Chemical and Biological Arms Control Institute.

The study, released last month, calls for greater transparency and better budget planning. The government has allocated an estimated $11 billion for biological defense between 2002 and 2004, an increase of 67.6 percent.

"Greater budget clarity would produce a better metric to evaluate bow effectively money is spent, whether expenditures are on target, what gaps exist and what more needs to be done as a matter of priority," said the report, which was compiled under the auspices of the non-partisan Nuclear Threat Initiative. "That budget clarity does not now exist."

In researching the report, Michael Moddie, CBACI president, noted that information was difficult to acquire. "The problem is not so much that information is not made available publicly, but that it is poorly presented and explained," he said.

The study recommends a more stable and coordinated platform for bio-defense funding. The administration's Office of Management and Budget should send Congress a single, coordinated document that covers all bio-defense spending by the government in the current year, as well as provide projections for such spending in the five following years, the report recommended.

"Bio-defense appropriations should be made over a five-year period, with a 'budget wall' around bio-defense spending, to help stabilize funding and make it less vulnerable to disruptions," the report suggested. "Greater attention must be given to the structure, timing, and coordination of state and local grant programs."

The report said that immediate priorities have obstructed the funding of a longer, more comprehensive strategy. The report added that the entire public health network needs "sustained investments" to become strong enough to handle a mass casualty event, which echoed complaints that the current system would buckle under the strain of a serious biological attack.