WASHINGTON — Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) came to the National Naval Medical Center on Wednesday to thank the microbiologists who identified the anthrax that threatened his staff, view the deadly bacteria under a microscope and pitch a plan for billions of dollars to counter bioterrorism.
At the same time, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) was pushing legislation to impose strict controls on who can handle anthrax and other deadly agents that can be turned into weapons. And a House Judiciary panel was moving to criminalize anthrax hoaxes.
On Capitol Hill, where legislators have been jolted in recent weeks by the anthrax scare, bioterrorism has become an unstoppable issue--likely to be addressed on multiple fronts before Congress finishes for the year.
Some legislation should draw little opposition. No legislator will argue that people have a right to scare the public with the joking or malicious use of suspicious white powder that turns out to be talcum or sugar. Nor will anyone quibble with efforts to track down how many laboratories stock anthrax for legitimate research.
But efforts to pour more money immediately into the anti-bioterrorism campaign could meet resistance from President Bush.
So far the administration has proposed spending $1.5 billion to answer the threats. Those emergency funds would be added to $345 million budgeted for bioterrorism programs in the Department of Health and Human Services. Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson said last month that the proposal would substantially strengthen government capabilities by investing in state and local readiness and expanding stocks of smallpox vaccine, antibiotics and other medical supplies.
This week, the administration also announced that it would channel $175 million to the U.S. Postal Service to buy irradiation equipment to sanitize mail and take other steps to protect postal workers.
But senators from both parties are talking about doubling the Bush proposal, and House Democrats--eager to push a politically popular spending measure in opposition to Republican-sponsored tax cuts--would more than quadruple it.
Daschle has a personal stake in the matter. Twenty of his aides who work in the Hart Senate Office Building were found to be exposed to anthrax spores after a letter addressed to him was opened there Oct. 15. Health officials say none has shown signs of actual illness; all the aides and many others who were in the area at the time are taking precautionary antibiotics.
