When the Senate Appropriations Committee meets on Wednesday, the Obama administration will mount a full-court press to foist its whopping $6.2 billion EbolaCare spending plan on taxpayers. Thats $6.2 billion with a b — six times what the U.N. said it needs to end the Ebola crisis in West Africa. The White House is labeling it emergency funding. Not so fast. Read the fine print. Most of the money will be going to Africa, but not just to treat Ebola patients or for Ebola research. Its a typical Obama administration spread-the-wealth scheme kicked up a notch to redistribute American resources to poor countries. On Aug. 28, the World Health Organization presented a plan to stop Ebola with a $1 billion price tag. The Obama proposal costs more because it would pay for a permanent health care infrastructure in African countries — constructing hospitals and laboratories and training medical workers and public health officials. Thats a massive transfer of wealth — twice the GDP of Liberia. It is also a radical shift in foreign aid priorities that demands scrutiny; $6.2 billion is twice what we give Israel. Speaking of priorities, EbolaCare would cost more than what the U.S. spends on all cancer research, even though cancer kills 360,000 Americans a year. EbolaCare would also cost six times what the president allocated to fight superbugs like Staph and C. diff that rage through hospitals in America, killing 23,000 patients a year. How about the mysterious spread of Enterovirus D 68 to 29 states, where it has killed 11 people, mostly children, and paralyzed 70 more? Wheres the program to investigate that? Helping Ebola victims is the right thing to do, but $6.2 billion is a whacky number. Obama wants to spend as much on Ebola as on HIV, even though HIV kills over 1.5 million people a year in poor countries, 300 times the Ebola toll. Labeling the request an emergency weasels around Congress rule that any spending additions have to be offset elsewhere in the federal budget. Taxpayers get clobbered. They also have every reason to worry their money will disappear down the rat hole of corruption. Liberian officials say tens of millions of dollars and supplies of medical equipment and food donated by relief organizations routinely go missing. Those Liberians say they often have to buy protective medical gear on the black market at inflated prices after its been stolen. Read More At Investors Business Daily: news.investors/ibd-editorials-on-the-right/111114-725945-obama-would-spend-six-times-what-un-says-is-needed.htm#ixzz3Io31msZx Follow us: @IBDinvestors on Twitter | InvestorsBusinessDaily on Facebook
Posted on: Wed, 12 Nov 2014 00:26:55 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015