The Bioterrorism Act becomes law

In the wake of 9/11 and the anthrax attacks, the Public Health Security and Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response bill was introduced to parliament on December 11, 2001 and became law on June 12, 2002 and became known as the Bioterrorism Act.

As stated the act is to “improve the ability of the United States to prevent, prepare for, and respond to bioterrorism and other public health emergencies.”

Amongst other things the Bioterrorism Act “addressed the accelerated approval of priority Medical Counter Measures (MCM) and the development of a final rule on using animal models [1] for when human efficacy studies are not feasible or ethical.” The Act established the Strategic National Stockpile (SNS) of vaccines and other MCM.