If it feels like the new administration has its eye on your medicine cabinet, you’re probably right. The FDA has issued a flurry of new warnings since President Obama took office.
From nose sprays to Tylenol, advisories about health risks and new warning labels have proliferated.
“Obama certainly when he was campaigning and since has said he would like to shake up the agency,” said Ivan Wasserman, a lawyer whose Washington D.C. firm Manatt, Phelps, and Philips specializes in FDA enforcement.
KCBS' Janice Wright reports
The agency that regulates everything from lipstick to pop tarts is held in generally low regard by the public. Fifty-two percent give the Food and Drug Administration negative ratings when it comes to drug safety.
Wasserman said that explains what’s driving the work of two newly appointed FDA commissioners, Dr. Peggy Hamburg and Dr. Josh Sharpenstein.
“They both have said they’re going to be more aggressive in enforcement,” Wasserman told KCBS’s Janice Wright.
Two smoking cessation drugs to carry the strongest safety warning about side effects. And just this past week came the news from an FDA panel of experts that the pain reliever in Tylenol can be fatal. Vicodine and Percoset should be pulled from the market, the panel recommended.
But food security may outweigh all other public concerns. Polls show 56 percent believe the agency does a poor job of regulating the quality of imported food.
(jro)
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