The Head of the FDA is Leaving. Here’s Why That’s a Big Deal.
On Thursday, the Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, Margaret Hamburg, announced her intention to step down in March after six years in one of the toughest jobs in government. Inheriting the FDA at a moment of crisis, she endured a few scandals of her own while stabilizing the agency, so her departure after such a long and challenging tenure is not necessarily a surprise.
But the timing is significant, because it comes at what one close FDA observer, Professor Daniel Carpenter of Harvard, calls “a deregulatory moment” at the FDA. The agency faces a bipartisan push on Capitol Hill to reform key elements of its authority, including how it approves drugs and medical devices, the reach of its oversight authority and possibly the methods by which it is funded....
