Pandemic Readiness Bill Pushes CDC-Private Sector Partnerships

A sweeping pandemic preparedness bill aims to encourage CDC collaboration with the private sector, an effort to break down an agency culture a top Republican described as so insular that it contributed to testing delays and other problems early in the pandemic.

“I think it’s cultural because there’s a fight to produce anything that’s not internally generated,” Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee as well as the architect of the 2006 Pandemic and All Hazards Preparedness Act and its two reauthorizations, said during a briefing Thursday.

Burr and HELP Chair Patty ...