It was an honor to testify before the U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies on July 2. The topic of the hearing was the President’s plan to develop and distribute a COVID-19 vaccine. Also testifying were Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Gary Disbrow, acting director of Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA). The nearly three-hour hearing allowed a productive exchange of information on this critical topic and many of NIH’s high-priority efforts to develop vaccines and therapeutics for COVID-19. Credit: C-Span.
I testified before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions as part of a hearing titled “Shark Tank: New Tests for COVID-19.” Also testifying was Gary Disbrow (left), Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Responses, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. We started the hearing wearing masks. But due to some technical difficulties with the sound system, we removed them to elevate our voices, while maintaining good physical distancing. I then presented some of the inspiring efforts now underway to combat the novel coronavirus. That includes the recently launched Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics (RADx) Initiative and its national technology development competition to increase our nation’s testing capacity. This “shark tank”-like competition is now encouraging science and engineering’s most inventive minds to develop rapid, easy-to-use technologies to test for the presence of SARS-CoV-2. The hearing was held on May 7, 2020 in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. Credit: United States Senate
