CRIME NIPC Daily Report 26 June, 2002

From: George Heuston (GeorgeH@private)
Date: Wed Jun 26 2002 - 15:04:03 PDT

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    Smallpox vaccinations for health care workers.   The Centers for Disease
    Control (CDC) and the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices
    (ACIP) recently recommended that the federal government provide smallpox
    vaccinations to about 10,000 to 20,000 health care workers. The panel
    recommended that the smallpox response teams that would investigate
    smallpox cases, as well as health care workers at hospitals designated
    to treat smallpox patients and their contacts, be immunized. Hospitals
    would be designated for smallpox treatment, and response teams created,
    through state bio-terrorism preparedness plans funded by the CDC.
    ACIP's recommendations will be submitted to Health and Human Services
    Secretary Tommy Thompson, who will confer with other public health
    officials and consider changes to the vaccination policy.  Dr. Julie
    Gerberding, acting deputy director of the CDC, said if the panel's
    recommendations are adopted, vaccinations could begin "by the fall" of
    2002. The federal government has pledged to obtain enough of the vaccine
    to immunize every US citizen by the end of 2002.     
    (Newswires, 25 Jun)
    
    United Airlines Seeks $1.8B Federal Loan.  United Airlines asked the
    government Monday for $1.8 billion in loan assistance, making it the
    biggest carrier to date to seek help from a loan guarantee program
    created to prop up the ailing industry after 11 September. United
    Airlines, the nation's No. 2 airline, has lost about $1 billion since
    the attacks and is the third major carrier to seek federal guarantees,
    after America West and US Airways. (Washington Post, 24 Jun)
    
    Enlisting science in terrorism fight.  On 25 June, the National Academy
    of Sciences released a report titled Making the Nation Safer: The Role
    of Science and Technology in Countering Terrorism.  The report urges the
    US to better exploit its vast scientific resources to fight terrorist
    threats by urging scientists to immediately implement existing
    technology in order to better control nuclear weapons, create more
    vaccines, and protect shipping containers, ventilation systems, and key
    elements of the power grid.  Further, it recommends the creating of an
    independent homeland security institute within the newly proposed
    Department of Homeland Security with an undersecretary of technology to
    coordinate communication between national academies, the National
    Institutes of Health, and the White House Office of Science and
    Technology Policy.  (CNET News, 25 Jun)
    
    New command would meld missile defense and offense.  The Pentagon plans
    to create a new command that combines the military network that warns of
    missile attacks with its force that can fire nuclear or non-nuclear
    weapons at suspected nuclear, chemical and biological weapons sites
    around the world.  The new command would harness in one entity the
    nation's missile warning network and the new national missile-defense
    system, as well as the country's ability to plan and launch offensive
    strikes with nuclear and conventional weapons. The command would support
    the Bush administration's new doctrine of pre-emptive action against
    states and terrorist groups that are trying to develop weapons of mass
    destruction, officials said.  Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and
    Gen. Richard B. Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have
    briefed President Bush on the plan in recent days. (NY Times, 25 Jun)
    



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