Syria Nerve Gas Attack Points to U.S. Need For New Antidote
A nine year-old sarin gas attack survivor, Hassan Dallal, receives medical treatment at a Syrian hospital on April 5, 2017.
Photographer: Mohammed Karkas/Anadolu Agency via Getty ImagesBack in the early 2000s—after Sept. 11, the anthrax attacks, and the rumors of chemical weapons in Iraq—the U.S. government began stockpiling drugs that could be used as antidotes for deadly nerve agents. To spur pharmaceutical companies to develop new and improved drugs, despite their limited profitability, Congress passed Project BioShield, a multibillion-dollar program that’s helped fund more than a decade’s worth of research and development.
Last week’s mass sarin attack in Syria, as well as February’s assassination of North Korea’s Kim Jong Nam with VX poison, served as grim reminders that the threat hasn’t gone away.