Those who do not learn from history...
Millions of people across America were stunned to learn this week that they may not have access to flu shots thanks to a debilitating gaffe by a British company which supplied half the vaccines. Once the inevitable finger-pointing began, it became apparent that such a circumstance should not have come as such a surprise. In fact, health experts have been warning for years of the pitfalls with the current vaccination system, specifically the shortage of suppliers. An October 17th NYT article elaborated:
"We're in the middle of a crisis that could have been averted,'' said Dr. Irwin Redlener, associate dean of the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University and director of its national center for disaster preparedness.
In particular, public health experts have long cautioned against the country's dependence on a few vaccine makers, and yet this has become standard practice. There are now only two major manufacturers for the nation's supply of flu vaccine, and at least a half-dozen other vaccines are made by single suppliers. Britain, by contrast, has spread its order for flu vaccines among five suppliers, precisely to avoid the kind of predicament America now faces.
Is this an isolated incident of government failing to act on experts advising of an impending crisis? Not by a long shot. Most of you may remember the blackout in the summer of 2003 which left huge swaths of the Northeast -- including New York City and Detroit -- without power for tens of hours. Well, shortly after that crisis, it came to light that (surprise!) energy officials had been warning of an impending disaster for years. A NYT article from August 15, 2003, included the chilling admission that:
It was five years ago that a federal task force of prominent experts warned the Department of Energy that the reliability of the electrical system was based on a mishmash of voluntary standards, and that Washington needed to impose mandatory rules on the electric industry.
"Failure to act," the task force wrote, "will leave substantial parts of North America at unacceptable risk." Its report was written at the Energy Department's request by prominent engineers and policy makers.
As recently as last month, however, the Energy Department was saying exactly the same thing. While electricity demand has shot up by 25 percent since 1990, construction of transmission systems has declined by 30 percent, the department said.
"The nation's aging electromechanical electric grid cannot keep pace with innovations in the digital information and telecommunications network," the department said in a report that called for massive investment by the industry and government in a new system by 2030.
"Power outages and power quality disturbances cost the economy billions of dollars annually. America needs an electric superhighway to support our information superhighway."
Standards for a more reliable system were not opposed by the industry, and were included in an energy bill that came before Congress in 2001. The bill never passed because of disputes over matters like drilling in the Alaskan wilderness and efficiency standards for cars. Such disputes are holding up a similar bill that is pending in Congress.
What can possibly explain consistent government complacency in the face of indisputible evidence of the need to act? Largely, the answer lies in the institution of government itself. One of the two prevailing theories of public policy goes that elected officials are rational actors always looking out for their self-interest, and when that intersects with the public good, great. The other says that elected officials do try to accomplish the public good, but are still responsive to electoral concerns.
Within this context, whichever theory you subscribe to, Congress should not have been proactive when it came to the electrical grid or flu vaccines. First of all, there is zero electoral gain in saying, "I've just ensured your power won't go out in five years," because naturally people aren't going to care since their power hasn't gone out yet. Worse still is that when their power does go out and then comes back on, they stop caring again (this is of course a simplification, but the basic paradigm applies; go ahead and try to find a corpus of substantive actions that have been taken to resolve the basic electrical grid problems.). Secondly, fixing either problem costs money, and spending money with no immideate, tangible benefit to show for it is bad politics. Throw in the more knotty intricasies of public policy -- pork, geographic interests, etc. -- and a picture begins to appear of a government gridlocked by its own institutional bureaucracy.
These examples -- and there are countless others -- should illustrate a single point: the problem runs far deeper than any subcommittee or Congressperson. At its core, the federal government needs to spur a fundamental evolution. The issue is not so much with democracy or the specifics of elections, though they certainly play a role, but rather most of the blame lies with the ways that Congress takes inputs and turns them into outputs. In 2004, that procedure can only be termed as reactionary.
Every time a crisis hits which could have been easily avoided, the government is given an opportunity and impetus to evaluate itself and propose changes. As is to be expected with such a status quo body, the pitch always sails by. It might be time, then, for citizens to help them swing; otherwise, instead of electricity or flu shots, the next thing we might be missing is our lives.
-Elliot
