In the January 1st issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, 12 former commissioners of the U.S Food and Drug Administration, collectively covering 35 years of leadership, wrote a joint article titled “A Threat to Evidence-Based Vaccine Policy and Public Health at the FDA.” In November, Vinay Prasad, FDA’s chief medical officer, sent a memo to FDA scientists accusing those who express concerns about current policy to outside parties as being “unethical” and “illegal” and instructed staff members whom disagree with the new framework to “submit your resignation letters.”
Prasad is overseen by Martin Makary, the FDA’s commissioner, whose boss is R.F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of Health and Human Services. The issue was their new and future vaccine oversite production policy. The former commissioners voiced their concern of what was happening to public health and the FDA. This is after many FDA employees were fired by DOGE.
In 1906, under President Teddy Roosevelt, the first Food and Drug Act agency was formed to protect our food and what few drugs and vaccines we had then. Sinclair Lewis’s powerful muckraking book “The Jungle” was then a strong stimulus to new public health laws and federal department development. In 1938, under President Franklin Roosevelt, the FDA grew stronger, focusing on new drugs and the importance of vaccines and updating them. Over time, the FDA, like the CDC focusing on infectious disease, gained the trust of not only the U.S. population but that of the whole world. That is until now.
The FDA, even before Trump, was often criticized for being too conservative and too late in approving new drugs and medical devices. Their defense was to protect the safety of the population. In the late 1950s, 46 countries (mostly European) approved the use of the drug thalidomide for morning sickness. Over 10,000 babies were born with hideous deformities and many more miscarriages due to the drug. We were not one of those 46 countries because of our FDA’s research and warning. Examples like this are how trust of the FDA developed, but also where lessons like this are all too easily forgotten.
It seems RFK Jr. and his minions are on a mission to not only destroy the CDC, but also the FDA. They don’t understand open scientific inquiry and why it needs to exist as well as be protected. They don’t care about the wonderful past accomplishments of the CDC and FDA. They are all there because of Trump’s blaming COVID-19 and true heroes like Dr. Anthony Fauci for his lost election. To them, public health is the problem not the solution. Destroying trust is their mission.
It’s time we get rid of all these ignorant, dangerous people from their current positions of power. Our elections this year and in 2028 are important to make that happen. Five years ago on Jan. 6, our current leaders proved they also don’t trust free and open elections and are now suggesting that we don’t need future elections at all. We the people (you and me) at all costs must guarantee that elections happen and that these dangerous people are removed from office. Our lives depend on it!
Nick Perencevich is a semi-retired physician who lives in Concord.