Opinions
Opinions
| Date | Opinions | Topic |
|---|---|---|
| Apr 18, 2010 |
"Now that Congress has pushed through its complicated legislation to reform the health insurance system, it could take one more simple step to protect the health of all Americans." |
Antibiotics in Food Animal Production |
| Apr 4, 2013 |
''Crackdown Needed on Specialty Pharmacies'' "The deaths and illnesses linked last fall to a New England pharmacy operating in the regulatory shadows as a cut-rate drug manufacturer is one of the biggest pharmaceutical public health disasters in American history." |
Drug Manufacturing and Distribution, Drug Safety |
| Oct 22, 2009 |
"Congress blundered badly when it gave the credit card industry as long as 15 months to phase out the deceptive and predatory practices that were outlawed in a new law enacted in May." |
|
| Jan 7, 2012 |
"A nonprofit research center based in Phoenix analyzed 80 brands of beef, pork, chicken and turkey in five cities -- and found that 47 percent contained staphylococcus aureus, which can cause everything from skin infections to pneumonia to blood poisoning. Of the staph germs detected, half were antibiotic-resistant." |
Antibiotics in Food Animal Production |
| Aug 30, 2012 |
''Deadly Wait for Food Safeguards'' Almost two years after President Barack Obama signed the first major changes to food-safety laws since the 1930s, they're still sitting on the back burner. The Office of Management and Budget hasn't signed off on the changes, further delaying reforms that have been debated for years. |
Food Safety |
| Jul 16, 2012 |
''Delays and Difficulties in Assessing Metal-on-Metal Hip Implants'' More than 500,000 U.S. patients have received metal-on-metal hip prostheses, most of which were implanted between 2003 and 2010. These prostheses entered the market through the 510(k) pathway at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), whereby manufacturers need only demonstrate substantial equivalence to a device already on the market to gain approval. Unfortunately, there is now compelling evidence that these implants fail at a higher rate than hip prostheses made of other materials. |
Drugs and Devices at the FDA |
| Sep 2, 2010 |
''Delhi's Fake Drug Whitewash'' Counterfeit drug expert Roger Bate said that a report issued by India's Central Drug Standard Control Organization this summer indicating that less than .1% of drugs sampled in the country were fakes is flawed and contradicts well-established findings by the government and scholars that suggest the number of counterfeits is much higher. |
Drug Manufacturing and Distribution, Drug Safety |
| Jun 26, 2012 |
''Disclosure can address doctors' conflicts of interest'' Pew Prescription Project Director Daniel Carlat opines in the Philadelphia Inquirer: "Monetary relationships among doctors and drug and device companies are not inherently bad; in fact, they are crucial for advancing medical research and patient care. Yet they can also skew prescribing practices and research results. That's why transparency and education are such an elegant solution: They allow these often important relationships to exist, but only on the condition that other professionals and patients are fully informed about them." |
Medical Safety |
| Aug 29, 2011 |
Distribution System OK, But it Can be Exploited Drug distribution may involve many trading partners, which can make it difficult to determine the products’ sources or authenticity. Medicines are often bought and sold across state lines; moved in whole or partial lots; and repackaged or relabeled. These practices may be appropriate, but bad actors also may exploit vulnerabilities in this system. |
Drug Safety |
| Jan 3, 2010 |
"One of the profound blessings in the age of modern medicine is that, when infection sets in, doctors can draw upon an array of antibiotics to knock the germs for a loop. Just imagine how it would have been for our ancestors, for whom a simple cut or bad tooth could mean "blood poisoning" and death." |
Antibiotics in Food Animal Production |
| Jul 3, 2012 |
''Drug, device reform gets bipartisan push'' "The U.S. Supreme Court's eagerly awaited Affordable Care Act ruling unfortunately overshadowed the unusually bipartisan work underway at the U.S. Capitol last week, where Congress finalized sweeping legislation crammed with smaller-scale but still vital health reforms." |
Drug Safety, Drugs and Devices at the FDA |
| Jan 16, 2013 |
''Editorial: An Unconscionable Delay'' "After two frustrating years of delay, the U.S. Food and Drug administration should soon have the power to prevent food-borne outbreaks rather than merely reacting to them." |
Food Safety |
| Mar 23, 2012 |
''Editorial: Crack down on counterfeit drugs'' Strong, national 'track and trace' system is overdue. |
Drug Safety |
| Jan 10, 2013 |
''Editorial: Late Better Than Never for New Food-Safety Rules'' "The Food and Drug Administration has proposed the most sweeping changes in food-safety rules in decades. The changes being made under the Food Safety Modernization Act, which became law in 2011, are long overdue and should be implemented as soon as possible." |
Food Safety |
| Jan 11, 2013 |
Editorial: ''New FDA Food Safety Rules Are a Huge Step Forward'' "At long last, after seven frustrating and sometimes deadly decades of inaction, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has the power it needs to recall tainted foods and require common-sense safety measures for farmers and food manufacturers. But the new food safety rules announced last week won't do much good if there's no money to enforce them, and therein lies the rub." |
Food Safety |
| Nov 26, 2012 |
''Editorial: White House Dallies on Food-Safety Law'' ''The Obama administration continues to drag its feet on a landmark consumer-protection law that could have made this week's Thanksgiving feast, leftovers and snacks considerably safer to eat.'' |
Food Safety |
| Oct 7, 2010 |
''Egg Inspections: The View From the F.D.A.'' "Contrary to your article, Food and Drug Administration inspections of the egg industry are on track." |
Food Safety |
| Jan 8, 2009 |
"While your editorial ('Delmarva travel warning,' Tuesday) made light of the dangers of driving behind trucks transporting intensively raised chickens..." |
Antibiotics in Food Animal Production |
| May 19, 2012 |
''Eric J. Greene: Landmark food law in political limbo?'' "When President Barack Obama last year signed a bill hailed as a milestone in food safety, he stood at an exceedingly rare intersection where persuasive majorities of businesses, policymakers and consumers wanted the same thing." |
Food Hazards |
| Jan 10, 2012 |
"Last week, the Food and Drug Administration took a small step toward reducing the routine use of antibiotics in livestock, a practice that creates drug-resistant pathogens and threatens the effectiveness of some antibiotics in human medicine." |
Antibiotics in Food Animal Production |
| Jan 13, 2012 |
''Fatter cows, sicker people'' "The FDA has restricted the use of a minor antibiotic used by the meat industry. It's a small step to counter the widespread overuse of antibiotics on healthy animals, which helps create antibiotic-resistant bacteria that harms humans." |
Antibiotics in Food Animal Production |
| Mar 11, 2013 |
''FDA Must Ensure Safety of Imported Food'' "Several months ago, my life was changed forever when I fell severely ill after eating imported ricotta cheese contaminated by the dangerous bacteria Listeria. Protections in a new U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) law could help prevent infections, like mine, from harming other Americans. But they need to be fully implemented to help anyone." |
Food Safety |
| Nov 9, 2010 |
''FDA relies too much on tipoffs, not enough on drug checks'' "A drug-company whistle-blower last month pocketed $96 million -- her share of the money Medicare and Medicaid paid for tainted drugs. The fee is way too high -- employees will drop a dime for far less." |
Drug Manufacturing and Distribution, Drug Safety |
| Jan 6, 2012 |
''FDA takes step in right direction'' "Wednesday's announcement that federal drug regulators will now require U.S. farmers and ranchers to limit their use of certain antibiotics in cows, pigs, chickens and turkeys is a long overdue positive ruling that should help reduce the growing threat that antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections pose to humans. Welcome as the edict is, it does not go far enough. Additional restrictions or, preferably, bans on their use are necessary to properly safeguard public health." |
Antibiotics in Food Animal Production |
| Jan 16, 2013 |
''FDA: Plain Sense is the Key for New Food Safety Guidelines'' "The new food safety guidelines proposed for the people who supply the nation's food, including farmers and manufacturers, are a good preventative step toward a healthy America." |
Food Safety |
