While the amount of funding in play pales next to the overall scale of the planned $3.5 trillion economic package that Democrats hope to push through Congress in the coming week, advocates are arguing that the stakes are high: Without at least $30 billion of federal investment, they say, the nation could be left vulnerable to a devastating repeat of the covid crisis, or worse.
But a budget blueprint adopted by Congress last month envisions delivering only a fraction of that total — less than $10 billion — which some are warning would squander an important opportunity while Washington and the world are focused on the threat posed by pandemics.
The White House in recent days has circulated a memo to key congressional leaders arguing for the pending bill to provide at least $15 billion in pandemic prevention funding — dollars that might have to be diverted from other administration priorities. Even that amount, the memo says, would only provide a “jump-start” to an estimated $65 billion effort needed in the coming decade to prepare vaccines, therapies and tests that can be quickly scaled to blunt emerging disease threats. ...
