A Special Report By Leonard G. Horowitz, D.M.D., M.A., M.P.H. December 2001

Background on the Anthrax Vaccine Maker-Bioport

1. In March 16, 1999, Robert C. Myers DVM* Chief Operating Officer of BioPort-America's only anthrax vaccine maker-appealed to a Senate Appropriations Committee for urgent funding for both anthrax and smallpox vaccines. In 1996, in his own words, he “was part of a team of organizations, led by Battelle Memorial Institute, which came together to compete for the Department of Defense's Joint Vaccine Acquisition Program JVAP. Despite there being dozens of potential bioterrorist threats, Dr. Myers stated these two threats were the greatest since anthrax is easy to handle and “because smallpox is highly contagious and probably most of the world is now susceptible. . . .”

He also testified, “Suppose we have a smallpox vaccine stockpile and a manufacturing capability. . . . Funding for adequate security must be included in this program if the threat is to be optimally minimized. Included in these security measures and to prevent against natural disaster, there should be two or more geographical separate manufacturing facilities and two or more facilities for storage of the manufactured vaccine.” He further stated that few companies wished to become involved in the production of anthrax and smallpox vaccines due to the high expense and risks involved in research and development. Today, the only other companies linked to smallpox vaccine production include Baxter, Aventis Hoechst-Rhone Poulenc subsidiary OraVax/Acambis, and Fort Dodge Animal Health as detailed in the accompanying flow chart.(8)

2. The preceding year (September 1998), Bioport Corporation took over a failing anthrax vaccine business from state-owned Michigan Biologic Products Institute. Less than a month later, the company landed an exclusive $29 million contract with the Department of Defense to “manufacture, test, bottle and store the anthrax vaccine.” Admiral William J. Crowe, Jr., a former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and close personal aid to President Bill Clinton, with no financial investment of his own, received 22.5% of Bioport's stock to promote, secure, and manage military anthrax vaccine contracts.(9)

3. Bioport's principal investor was Saudi business man Fuad El-Hibri -a close friend of the bin Laden family, and a previous merger and acquisitions manager for the Rockefeller linked Citigroup in New York.(9,10)

4. Bioport shares were also held by The Carlyle Management Group-America's 11th leading defense contractor largely directed by past CIA director Frank Carlucci, James Baker III, and George H.W. Bush, according to several investigators.(11)

5. According to the Associated Press, Past President George H.W. Bush acts as a business agent for the Carlyle Group and wealthy Saudi Royal families including the bin Ladens.(12)

6. Between 1998 and 2000, Bioport successfully negotiated through a steady storm of controversy and illegalities to secure ongoing defense contracts for anthrax vaccine.(9,10,13) ¹⁾

How One of Big Pharma’s Most Corrupt Companies Plans to Corner the COVID-19 Cure Market

One of the most politically-connected yet scandal ridden vaccine companies in the united states, with troubling ties to the 2001 anthrax attacks and opioid crisis, is set to profit handsomely from the current coronavirus crisis.

Mint Press News - April 14, 2020 by Whitney Webb and Raul Diego

Ibrahim El-Hibri, a Venezuelan citizen who had made a fortune working for US telecommunications companies, had become a silent partner in Porton International. His son, Fuad El-Hibri, was made director of Porton Products, Ltd, a Porton International subsidiary, which was the conduit by which the El-Hibri family had made a killing selling anthrax vaccines to Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states at $300 to $500 a dose. Fuad El-Hibri had previously been an intelligence contractor for Booz Allen Hamilton and an executive at the Wall Street giant, CitiGroup.

The elder El-Hibri had a knack for business that ran back decades to the 1970s when he lived in Qatar, where he befriended the then-head of US Central Command, Admiral William Crowe. The career military man kept in touch with El-Hibri through the years and perhaps even gave him a few business leads at a time when Crowe was also serving on the board of pharmaceutical behemoth, Pfizer. Crowe would later pick up the phone in late 1997 (officially at least, but probably well before) to make a proposition to his old friend.

In 1997, then-US Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen announced a plan to vaccinate every single member of the US Armed Forces against anthrax, which ultimately resulted in the vaccination of approximately 2.4 million troops by 2003. Admiral Crowe, who was serving as the US ambassador to the UK at the time, quickly contacted El-Hibri to discuss the US government anthrax vaccine market in light of this new Pentagon policy.

Though they were conveniently rescued by the unfortunate events of 2001, BioPort would soon lobby for larger contracts than ever before, calling for a massive increase in government purchases of their controversial anthrax vaccine. Riding the fear caused by the 2001 anthrax attacks, they pushed for the government to stockpile anthrax vaccine, not just for the military, but for civilians, postal workers, police and many more who could potentially be put in harm’s way were the anthrax attacks to repeat themselves.

One of their biggest proponents of expanding BioPort’s contracts was working for HHS at the time — Jerome Hauer, a man who not only had foreknowledge of the anthrax attacks, but had also participated in the Dark Winter simulation that would also predict those same attacks just months prior. Hauer would, months later, be appointed to a newly created position at HHS, one which oversaw the new biodefense stockpile from which BioPort would be a major beneficiary.

BioPort would be then renamed and repackaged as Emergent Biosolutions in 2004. It would then hire even more well-connected lobbyists and add several big names from government and the private sector to its board. One of these “big names” was none other than Jerome Hauer, who was added to Emergent’s board soon after leaving HHS. Hauer still remains a company director and sits on three of its corporate governance committees.

Not only did Emergent Biosolutions profit from national anthrax fears, they would also cash in on subsequent pandemic panics and later receive substantial backing from the Bill Gates-backed Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI). They would then turn their attention to the still-raging opioid addiction and overdose crisis by buying rights to the only drug approved for treating opioid overdoses at the scene while also suing any and all generic producers of this crucial, life-saving treatment.

Given its history, it should come as little surprise that Emergent Biosolutions is now set to profit from the Coronavirus (Covid-19) crisis. They are particularly well-suited to make record profits off of COVID-19, as they are backing not one, but two, vaccine candidates as well as an experimental blood plasma treatment already approved for trials in New York state, thanks in part to Jerome Hauer’s old boss, New York governor Andrew Cuomo. As noted in a previous article for The Last American Vagabond, the other main companies developing COVID-19 vaccines in the U.S. are strategic partners of the controversial Pentagon research agency DARPA, which has become increasingly aligned with HHS in recent years thanks to another Dark Winter participant, Robert Kadlec.²⁾³⁾

Emergent site archive ⁴⁾