WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Senator Pat Roberts today joined other members of Congress and senior Executive Branch and military officials in participating in an eye-opening pandemic flu exercise called “Global Tempest.”

“I was pleased to participate in this simulation today to strengthen our public health infrastructure,” Senator Roberts said. “It is critical to our homeland security that the federal government is able to anticipate or detect such a threat, and then if necessary, deter or manage a public health crisis. This was a real learning experience.”

The simulation projected that over 90 million episodes of illness could break out resulting in over 1.9 million deaths during a severe pandemic influenza scenario. The exercise mirrored that of the 1918 pandemic, commonly known as the Spanish flu, which was a world-wide crisis.

Organized by the National Strategic Gaming Center at the National Defense University, this crisis simulation was designed to provide government officials with insight into the complexity of emerging global security challenges. The exercise improved dialogue between the Executive and Legislative branches of the Federal government on critical national security issues. Immediately following the simulation, Members of Congress shared their policy recommendations with Mr. Pete Verga, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense.

Two Senators and eight Representatives participated in the exercise along with representatives from the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Department of Agriculture, Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, the Office of the Surgeon General, the US Northern Command, the US Agency for International Development, the Department of Transportation, the Homeland Security Council and the Joint staff. The state perspective was provided by a representative from the state Pennsylvania.

Last October, Senator Roberts joined Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) in introducing legislation to help prevent recurring shortages of flu vaccine and strengthen our vaccine delivery infrastructure so that the United States is able to respond to a crisis. The Clinton-Roberts bill, the Influenza Vaccine Security Act, addresses the causes of the influenza shortage by bringing increased stability to our nation’s seasonal flu vaccine market.

“I think we learned a good lesson from Hurricane Katrina: we must be prepared at all levels to deal with a large-scale public health emergency such as pandemic flu. As Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and a member of the Senate Agriculture and Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committees, I take this threat of flu pandemic very seriously and view it not only as a public health concern, but also a national security concern,” Senator Roberts said.