Opin­ion: It shouldn’t mat­ter who the FDA com­mis­sion­er is when it comes to con­tro­ver­sial drug ap­proval de­ci­sions

Sev­er­al years ago, I in­ter­viewed for a job and the em­ploy­er asked me to ex­plain some­thing shock­ing about the FDA that the gen­er­al pub­lic ei­ther doesn’t know or wouldn’t un­der­stand.

I thought for a minute and said, “The FDA com­mis­sion­er doesn’t weigh in on any drug ap­proval de­ci­sions.” And the in­ter­view­er looked at me quizzi­cal­ly, and said some­thing along the lines of, “That can’t be right.”

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