I am asking a question to the chair if you would agree with my observation. One reason i think statements have been made over there is they never believed we will get past a six year highway reauthorization bill over here. I am going to make it a deal so we can have the vote to take place and get on with the last and final vote so we would have that ready while the house is still in session. Whether individuals are facing themselves in the corner or that is not going to happen i dont know. Isnt it worth a try . That is my question. Let me respond to my colleague from oklahoma and thank him for his bipartisan leadership. You and senator boxer set a standard of bipartisanship when it comes to this issue. You have produced a sixyear authorization bill. Though i may not agree with the particulars thank you for that leadership on your bipartisan bases side. As far as the effort to speed up the senate so we can catch the house colleagues before they leave, i would support it completely but you and i both know any single senator can divert and stop that effort. I will support you in bringing this forward as quickly as possible. I appreciate that. And the only other question i had is the secretary part i asked you. There is time to do this. I will make every effort and i think senator boxer shares my position. This vote could be easily done tonight and allow the house to look at it. I would say the senator from oklahoma we have to appear to the better angels of our colleagues nature and a cooperative effort. I am happy to try. Let me just close and yield the floor to whomever would like to speak. This is a chance the American People do something the American People expect us to do. Why did we get sent here . I was sent here to solve problems make life better create an economy that is growing, there is nothing more bipartisan and more important than the infrastructure of this country. If you wonder about that go visit china. They are building cranes and highways and train routes in every direction because they are preparing their chinese economy for the 21st century. Is america . I dont think so. What we are doing is passing shortterm extensions of the highway trust fund. We cannot patch our way to prosperity. We cannot, on a shortterm bases, have a Long Term Plan to build americas economy. Because of the hard work on both sides of the aisle compromises are made to the point where we have a three year highway bill. Lets accelerate this in in the senate and pray our colleagues in the had yousouse decide to hang around long enough to take up this bill. Will the senator yield for one more question . I know you want to vacant the floor. But would the senator join me in trying to see if we can get uni unanimous consent to move forward . If they dont like the bill for some reason that is one thing. But to bring it forward so it can be done, i am inclined to hope we can encourage those who are killing time to join us in doing this. It is my intention to make that request and i would ask of the senator from illinois join me in that effort. I would ask my colleague from oklahoma to lets sit down and put this uc together and you take it as we do by custom to your cloak room and i am staying it to my mine and see if we can get it moving forward. I want to protect the rights of members but i think many of them would like to join us in accelerating this process so there is activity on the floor that is productive and i would be happy to work with you. I yield the floor. Tonight on cspan2, pentagon and cdc officials testify at a house hearing about the investigation into how packages containing live anthrax virus were accidently shipped to labs around the world. Fcc chair tom wheeler discusses Rural Broadband access and Video Services and the senate worked on the transportation spending bill. The Defense Department recently admitted a u. S. Army lab accidently shipped live anthrax to 192 facilities in all 50 states and seven Foreign Countries. Officials from the Defense Department and centers for Disease Control testified about the shipment at a house energy and subcommittee. Tim murphy from pennsylvania chairs this two hour hearing. Good morning, welcome to our hearing dealing with anthrax once again. The subcommittee examines continue concerns over the federal agent select program with the focus on shipments of live anthrax from the department of Defense Laboratory that occurred over a ten year period. As last year we held a similar hearing that proposed dozens of cdc researchers to live anthrax due to safety procedures not being followed. The cdc director testified quote we will take every step possible to prevent any future incident that will put our Laboratory Scientist and public at risk. Yet, here we are again. We examine the mistake of avian flew and the vials of small pox in the nih building months after the hearing and after the white house ordered safety stand down the cdc revealed there was a transfer of ebola from a cdc four lab to a cdc two lab. And despite the growing number of red flags these incidents keep happening. We learned an army lab in utah shipped anthrax to facilities across the globe. At least 192 labs have received shipments of the anthrax. The testing used to validate and insure the anthrax spores were not active failed to detect the live anthrax spores. What is most troubling is that doug way used this potentially deadly process for years. This is unacceptable. It is threatening the Nation Security and Public Health. The committee hopes to learn what is being done to prevent future safety lapses. The internal review of the circumstances surrounding the shipments of anthrax and according to the report the dod was unable to determine the root cause of how and why doug way labs shipped anthrax. It is said all of the labs operate outside of the experimental data. In other words, it seems the department of defense labs have been eradiating larger numbers of spores given. This revelation begs a lot of questions beginning with why. And why for so long . Who was responsible about making the decision on which inact inactivation process to use . And what is the cdcs role in developing the processes . According to a recent and all too familiar headline cdc announced it will conducting another review of how it regulates safety and security at bio terror labs. I think it is important to improve current regulations for processes and procedures. But the past review is not bringing about change for safety and standardized policies and procedures. As i said a year ago, what we have is a pattern of reoccurring issues of complacency and a lax culture of safety. Cdc corrector Freedman States this is a wakeup call but it appears the Snooze Button has been hit again. None of us want to be here again a year from now discussing another set of safety laps and heaven forbid a loss of life. The u. S. Accountability office is conducting work on high Containment Labs and go has been issuing recommendations for years requiring the strategy for high Containment Labs and the need for designing, structuring, commissioning and maintaining such labs yet the recommendation is not implemented which is one of the reasons we are here discussing another safety lapse threatening National Security and the Public Health. Today i would like to thank our witnesses for testifying here. I look forward to hearing from you. Please be forward with us as we learn about the procedures. This subcommittee will not relent on the compliance with select agent regulations and explore the possibility of an independent agency to oversee the labs. I recognize the Ranking Member from colorado. Thank you mr. Chairman. You say you dont want to be back here in a year like last year but we have been here in 2007 2009, 2014 and now 2015. So might as well mark your calendar now. And part of that is because it is important for the government to identify risk. But the work contains risk and that is why we have to contain oversight. I talked about the high Containment Lab we have in fort collins where we identified terrible lapses years ago and i worked with former colleague bob sheriff to get the built and i am proud of that. But we have to continue to make sure similar facilities across the country provide no risk to workers or the broader community. The details of the doug way incident do not inspire confidence. We are talking about a longterm series of shipments of live anthrax from the ground in utah which is one of the most sophisticated facilities in the world. This only came to light in may because of a private company contacting the cdc after discovering what it thought was activated anthrax was live anthrax. We are learns that 86 laboratories and seven Foreign Countries have received anthrax from doug way over the last 12 years. They transferred the live spores to an additional 106 labs. We are talking about almost 200 labs in all 50 states accidently receiving live anthrax for over a decade. No body seems to have fallen ill from these instances but i am worried this activity was going on for so long. I am eager to hear answers from dod on how this happened in the first place and what they are doing to make sure it doesnt happen again. The report released last week found insufficient Science Literature to develop protocols for the inactivation of spores. The doug way lab was relying on procedures that didnt sterilize the spores. This seems troubling. How have we conducted research on this dangerous pathogen without thoroughly understanding how to inactivate it . We need to see if we use similar protocols for other agents and if so i think we can agree we need to seize those operations to avoid putting the public at risk. Dod has issued a stop on shipping anthrax from the labs. This seems like an important first step. But i do want to know how that affects the research the lab was doing. Do we need to have to 200 labs working with anthrax . Can we limit the number of labs and limit the risk while still being able to do the important research. I want to hear if the breakdowns are indicative of broader problems at this site or across the higher containment. The incidents we have seen recently raise questions about whether we can trust high Containment Labs to handle select agents. In the last year, we have seen an anthrax exposure at cdc improper shipment of avian flu and even a potential ebola exposure at a cdc lab. I feel lucky we have not had anyone infected but it could happen. I hope you have answered on what we are doing to make serious changes and include the recommendations goa has made. With that i yield back. Anybody else on this side wish to make Opening Statements or comments . If not an article appeared in the usa today and i would like you to look at that and ask for consent to submit to the record . This is titled cdc key lab Incident Reporting policy despite scrutiny and promises. Now i will recognize mr. Palone. Thank you. I hope we can get to the bottom of this incident. Deputy of defense secretary described the lapses as a quote massive institutional failure and i hope it can be explained how this occurred. I am deeply relieved no one has fallen ill as a result of the lapses and i am hopeful this remains the case as dod and cdc continue to track the labs that receive the samples. But this incident raises questions about the safety of high Containment Laboratories across the country. Labs in the federal government and academic institutions and private companies handle dangerous pathogens under the federal select Agent Program. The labs perform important work and conduct research to improve our defenses against biological attack attacks and strengthening Public Health situations. Laboratories are require to restrict and imelement safe guards. They must make sure laboratories are trained on Safety Measures. They are subject to registration and inspections by the division of select agents and toxins. They are penalties associated with lapses and safety protocol and unauthorized use of agents is subject to penalties. Incidents involving ebola avian flu and other diseases raises the question of needing to stregthen the Safety Measures. Is the current Regulatory Framework sufficient . Do they are resources to insure oversight is robust . What is the cdc doing to prevent slab situations in the future. I look forward to hearing about the findings and recommendations from those reviews and how they can be used to enhance safety and security at all of the high laboratories. I look forward to hearing from goa about the recommendations to strengthen Safety Measures across high Containment Labs. I hope we can learn from this latest incident and take seriously the important recommendations made by recent and ongoing investigations by goa and others to make this program safer. We look forward to conductive discussion on how we can improve oversight and what this committee can do to facilitate that process. Again, i thank the chairman and Ranking Member as we proceed. I yield back. The gentlemen yields back and with no further comments we will go to our witnesses. So as you are aware. When the committee is holding an investigation hearing takes the testimony under oath. Do any of the witnesses have objection to testifying under oath . Under the rules of the house and committee, your entitled to be advised by council, do you any of desire to be advised by counsel . Rise and raise your right hand. Do you swear the testimony you are about to give is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth . All of the our witnesses have answered in the affirmative. You may now each give a five minute summary of your written statement. Pay attention to the lights there. We will start with dr. Hassell. Thank you, chairman murphy and Ranking Member deget te. I appreciate being able to talk about the shipment of live anthrax. I am the Deputy Assistant secretary of defense for chemical and biological defense. The use of inactivated or dead anthrax is important to develop ways to protect war fighters and the public from known biological threats. Doing this with the development and Testing Systems and diagnostic and decontamination policies. We learned of this on may 22nd 2015 when we were alerted by a private company reporting the growth of living anthrax in a sample at the doug way ground in utah. The cdc started working with dod officials and the laboratories and fbi. All known laboratories that received activated anthrax samples has been notified to stop working with the samples. And the laboratories that produced and operated anthrax were directed to stop producing, shipping and working with any activated anthrax other than purposes related to this current matter. Tested identified other batches containing live spores and on june 2nd the department of defense notified all known recipients of activated anthrax from doug way to stop working with material whether it was confirmed to contain live anthrax or not. 31 u. S. Citizens eight nondod and 23dod were placed on postexposure treatment that was completed yesterday. Returning to the subject of the four dod laboratories that produced activated anthrax, on may 29 the deputy of defense ordered all of them test anthrax in their inventory to identify the presence of live spores. The results are in and since 2003 the four laboratories made 149 batches of live anthrax spores. Of the 96 samples available to test 17 tested positive for the presence of live anthrax all coming from doug way. We know over the past 12 years, 86 laboratories in 20 states washington, d. C. And countries received directly from doug way inactivated samples with live spores. An additional 106 labs received secondary transfers from some of the 186 direct recipient labs bringing the total to 192 labs in all 50 states. We completed the root causes of the incident resulting in key findings including the key issue is lack of standards to guide the development of protocols, processes, and Quality Assurance measures. The result recommendations are grouped into enhance quality programs establish testing protocols based on relative Scientific Data and improve program management. The department is committed to insuring this doesnt happen again and we will implement the recommendations in the report and outlined by deputy work on the 23 rd of july. We remain committed to transparency as we go forward. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today and i welcome your questions. I want to note we have not had a chance to review a lot of your testimony because it wasnt in until 9 oclock and the Committee Rules are we ask for 48 hours. So when we get to the testimony at the last minute it is difficult for us to review it. I dont want to think that cdc is trying to frustrate our purposes here but i want to indicate to you if you could pass the word on to cdc that for future testimony we want the 48 hour limit adhered to. We would like to hear from you for five minutes at this point. Chairman murphy and Ranking Member and distinguished members of the subcommittee thank you for the opportunity to testify. I would like to share what the cdc has done with the release of live anthrax from doug way proving ground and provide information on the Selective Program cdc supports. Cdc works 24 7 to save lives and protect people. We activated the Operation Center in the face and uncertainty of this. We unde