Abolish the FDA?
Religion & Liberty Online

Abolish the FDA?

An interesting debate is going on over at Mere Comments. The main thread has to do with the morality of the Bush Administration’s approval of over-the-counter sales of the morning-after pill and the implications for Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate race. Leaving those issues aside, I was struck by a comment from “Daniel C.”, claiming that the problem really presents an “excellent case for dismantling the Food & Drug Administration.”

It’s a question worth raising. I don’t know enough about the history or current practice of the FDA to judge definitively one way or the other, but I know that there exists significant discontent with its role as (ostensibly) the nation’s guardian of food and drug safety. For example:

1. It constructs unreasonable obstacles to the delivery of medical technology.
2. It stifles pharmaceutical innovation because regulators are biased toward caution as opposed to risk.
3. Its evaluation process is distorted by rampant conflicts of interest on the part of the experts it employs to evaluate new products.

Kevin Schmiesing

Kevin Schmiesing, Ph.D., is a research fellow for the research department at the Acton Institute. He is a frequent writer on Catholic social thought and economics, is the author of American Catholic Intellectuals, 1895-1955 (Edwin Mellen Press, 2002) and is most recently the author of Within the Market Strife: American Catholic Economic Thought from Rerum Novarum to Vatican II (Lexington Books, 2004). Dr. Schmiesing holds a Ph.D. in American history from the University of Pennsylvania, and a B.A. in history from Franciscan University ofSteubenville. Author of Within the Market Strife and American Catholic Intellectuals, 1895—1955 (2002), he serves as Book Review Editor for the Journal of Markets & Morality. He is also executive director of CatholicHistory.net.