Combating future pandemics - Japan PM resignation - Economic recovery slows

The plan – released in a 27-page document titled “American Pandemic Preparedness: Transforming Our Capabilities” – calls for investing billions of dollars over the next decade to improve vaccines and therapeutics as well public health infrastructure, enhance the nation’s real-time monitoring capabilities and make upgrades to personal protective equipment.
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The funds would be go to a new “mission control” office at the Department of Health and Human Services that’s closely overseen by Congress. The U.S. would spend a total of $24.2 billion to develop and test new vaccines for a range of viruses and make improvements to vaccine distribution and manufacturing.
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Officials said the administration’s call to invest $65 billion is “modest” when taking into account that the current pandemic has cost the U.S. an estimated $16 trillion in lost economic output. It’s also smaller than what the nation spends on other programs, such as missile defense and anti-terrorism, which cost U.S. taxpayers $20 billion and $170 billion a year.