Bipartisan Senate bill seeks 9/11 style commission to investigate COVID-19 outbreak

Reckoning with the more the 750,000 Americans killed by the COVID-19 pandemic, the failures that stalked response, and the threat of future outbreaks, a bipartisan collection of four senators introduced a new bill last week to build a 9/11-style commission charged with investigating the outbreak and lessons to be learned from it.

S. 3203 was introduced by U.S. Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Roger Marshall (R-KS), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), and Joni Ernst (R-IA). Specifically, the Commission it would empower would be charged with investigating, among other things: the origin of COVID-19, the U.S. government response to the ongoing pandemic, the effectiveness of public health messaging surrounding it, international cooperation on COVID-19, availability of critical supplies, and the government’s role in vaccine/treatment development, testing, production, and distribution.

It has been endorsed by the Infectious Diseases Society of America.

“As the threat of major pandemics increases due to globalization and climate change, we must learn from what happened during this pandemic to ensure we’re prepared for any future outbreaks,” Feinstein said. “This bipartisan commission will ensure we learn all we can from the past 18 months, so the immense human suffering and economic devastation we’ve endured never happens again.”

In all, 10 members would be appointed to achieve this, five from each of the two major political parties. Their interim findings would be submitted to the President and Congress, no later than one year after the bill is passed, and a final report within 20 months of the Commission’s first meeting. In these investigations, the Commission will be able to hold hearings, collect testimony, administer oaths and issue subpoenas as needed.

“Americans are long overdue for a bipartisan commission investigating the origins of COVID-19, as well as finding out how we can prepare for, prevent, and recover from future global pandemics,” Marshall said. “As a physician, I think we always need to know the what, where, how, and why when giving a diagnosis. For this reason, it couldn’t be more important that we determine the origins of this infectious disease outbreak in order to ensure nothing like this ever happens again.”

The new bill would also begin a declassification review of information related to the origin of COVID-19.