By A.J. Evenson and Tim Martin
Lansing State Journal
November 2, 2000
BioPort Corp.'s first and loudest critic has submitted written testimony to a congressional committee questioning the ethics of managers at the Lansing lab that makes the anthrax vaccine.
State Rep. Lingg Brewer, D-Holt, wrote that a lab employee told him records were falsified in an incident prior to 1997 to approve the release of a batch of anthrax vaccine.
BioPort officials and the worker named in Brewer's written testimony - submitted to the U.S. House Committee on Government Reform last week - denied the claim Wednesday.
The controversy is the latest for the troubled company, which has been hampered by financial and safety concerns since taking over the lab's operation from the state in 1998. BioPort is the nation's only maker of the anthrax vaccine, a protection against a deadly biological weapon possessed by Iraq and other potential U.S. enemies, according to the Pentagon.
"I'm shocked and troubled by the cruel and false statements Rep. Brewer continues to make," said Bob Myers, chief scientific officer for BioPort and one of lab's original buyers. "I believe he has a deranged, irrationally motivated vendetta against me that's absolutely without foundation. I will explore all my options to get this idiocy to stop."
Brewer's testimony suggests records were forged at Myers' direction.
Judith Boice, the employee named in the testimony, also called Brewer's statements false.
"There's not one iota of truth," said Boice, a laboratory scientist manager who has worked more than two decades at the labs.
Boice has filed a grievance with the state on an unrelated matter. She and two other lab supervisors say they deserve royalty payments for their work on various products before the labs were sold to BioPort. A decision on the grievance is likely in the next two weeks.
Brewer stood by his testimony Wednesday, saying it was his understanding that it was submitted under oath. A congressional committee aide said Wednesday that while oral testimony taken at an actual hearing is under oath, written testimony is not.
Brewer was invited to appear at the committee's Oct. 11 hearing but was bumped from the agenda because of time constraints. Brewer's written testimony has been entered into the record of the Committee on Government Reform's anthrax vaccination investigation.
No specific action is planned on Brewer's testimony at this time, a committee aide said Wednesday. But the committee, chaired by Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., will likely have future hearings on the vaccine program.
Burton's committee held two hearings on the anthrax vaccination program in October. After those hearings, Burton said he plans to keep pressure on the military program.
Several of its members have suggested ending the anthrax vaccination program. Committee members say they have been contacted by more than 200 individuals who say the vaccine made them or their relatives sick.
More than 400 military personnel have faced discipline for refusing to take the vaccine - which was made mandatory by the military for 2.4 million active and reserve troops. About 490,000 troops have taken the vaccine since 1998. The military has scaled back the program because supplies have run low. BioPort can't make or sell new vaccine until the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approves renovated labs at the Lansing complex, a process company officials expect may be complete by mid-2001.
Brewer has been BioPort's most dogged critic, opposed to the company even before its bid was selected by the state.
BioPort was created in 1998, when a private group agreed to buy the former state-run Michigan Biologic Products Institute. The BioPort sale price was $25 million in cash, loans, product donations and royalties. But the state may not receive the full amount. So far the state has collected about $19 million.
Brewer has complained about the sale price and the buyers, saying it was a deal Gov. John Engler arranged to benefit insiders at the company. Two of the principal buyers - Myers and Rob van Ravenswaay - were managers of the lab when it was run by the state.
The sale passed inspection at several levels of state government and also survived a judicial review.
"These are the same things Rep. Brewer has been saying over and over again," BioPort spokeswoman Kim Brennen Root said. "As many bodies as possible have said this sale was legal and legitimate."
BioPort has since come under scrutiny in Congress for financial dealings with the Pentagon, and for health and safety concerns.
In 1999, the Pentagon gave BioPort an $18 million cash advance to help keep the company afloat as it pursued FDA approval. BioPort also is receiving an estimated $2 million each month for additional expenses tied to that approval.
Brewer's testimony renewed his call for further review of the sale and for the Pentagon to transfer the lab's operation to new management.
"It's time to stop rewarding bad performance and incompetence with truckloads of taxpayer dollars," Brewer said.
Contact A.J. Evenson at 377-1015 or aevenson@lsj.com or Tim Martin at 377-1061 or tmartin@lsj.com.