§9202 National Bio and Agro-defense Facility

Summary

Creates the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility as a national security laboratory. It must do research, development, and testing to help prevent, detect, respond to, or reduce harm from animal pests, animal diseases, and diseases that can pass from animals to people. The work defends the United States against natural or intentional biological and agricultural threats. Under that role, the facility’s mission is to protect the food supply, farming, and public health. It will combine animal and human-animal disease research; tackle dangerous zoonotic and foreign animal diseases and other biological threats; fill research gaps without duplicating other federal work; help carry out the research strategic plan under section 9203(a)(2); provide training; share data with federal agencies for threat assessments; and build partnerships to develop diagnostics, vaccines, drugs, and other countermeasures.