Anger over low funding for medical research needed to fight the Zika virus spilled over into a Wednesday morning hearing on the quickly spreading virus.
“Hearings may be good PR, but it is time to step up and fund more medical research,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., during a hearing of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
Zika is primarily spread through mosquito bites and causes a mild illness. Health agencies strongly suspect it also causes a birth defect called microcephaly.
President Obama officially requested $1.9 billion in emergency funds earlier this week. However, several Republicans have balked at the request, saying that money leftover from fighting the Ebola outbreak should be used instead.
The House Appropriations Committee called on the administration to use $1.4 billion held by the Department of Health and Human Services and $1.3 billion held by the State Department.
“These funds can and should be prioritized to meet the most pressing needs of mounting a rapid and full response to Zika,” Chairman Hal Rogers said in a letter to to the White House.
Warren focused more on the inability of Congress to consistently fund the National Institutes of Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Project Bioshield, which stockpile vaccines and treatments in case of any kind of outbreak.
Congress boosted funding for NIH in the latest spending bill by about $2 billion, but Warren said it wasn’t enough.
“Congress is strangling medical research, even with the small bump in funding,” she said.
