The Senate Appropriations Committee provided $870 million in pandemic flu preparedness funding to the Health and Human Services Department in its version of the 2007 war supplemental bill approved by the committee Thursday.

That is $99.7 million less than the funding the House provided in the version it passed Friday. The full Senate will consider the war supplemental spending bill March 26, with quick passage expected.

Differences between the two bills need to be resolved in a House/Senate conference and if the final bill still contains a timeline for withdrawal of troops from Iraq, as both versions currently do, President Bush has threatened a veto.

Bush asked for $7.1 billion in pandemic flu preparedness funding in his fiscal 2006 budget, and Congress provided $2.3 billion for pandemic preparedness in the 2006 war supplemental bill and $3.46 billion in the 2006 Defense Department appropriations bill.