Bad news. The dangerous anti-regulation campaign sweeping Congress has hit the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) – the agency tasked with ensuring the safety of our drugs and medical devices. Over the last two months, several members of Congress have introduced misguided bills that would make it easier for manufacturers to sell new, unsafe medical devices, and in turn put patients’ lives at risk.
FDA commissioner Margaret Hamburg (right) speaks with Public Citizen president Robert Weissman (left) at a Public Citizen event on July 25, 2011. Click on the photo above to view YouTube video of this event.
Evidently, some members of Congress are buying into the arguments from the medical device and pharmaceutical industries that the process to approve drugs and devices is too lengthy, blocking their products from the market, and depriving pharma and device companies of their precious profits. However, contrary to industry’s statements, the FDA recently reported that its approvals of new drugs have increased.
The industries’ predictable talking points come as they negotiate with the FDA and Congress over a process to reauthorize fees collected from the industry and reevaluate FDA rules and practices. The process is expected to be completed in 2012. Unfortunately, if these anti-safety initiatives gain traction the lives of patients will take a back seat in the negotiations.
The innovation and continued improvement of drugs and medical devices are important health care goals, but the FDA shouldn’t lose focus on ensuring their safety. Recent history shows that dangerous drugs and devices have unnecessarily injured or killed hundreds of thousands of patients, strongly indicating that industry profits trumped patient safety in numerous instances.
Financial Protection Bureau be gutted. That’s the hallmark of the Dodd-Frank law approved by Congress to prevent predatory lending, liar loans and the other abuses behind the housing bubble—and our subsequent Great Recession.
