Drug Safety
America's committment to drug safety began in 1906, when the agency that would become the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was created. Our drug safety laws have been improved throughout the intervening century, but the most important addition was the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act of 1938, which granted the agency real power for the first time. Most importantly, the 1938 act was the first law to require the testing of drugs before they were sent to market. It also banned drugs that didn’t list all their active ingredients and forced companies to truthfully describe the effects of their products. (Before the FDA got to it, Listerine advertised its ability to cure tuberculosis.)
Commentary
How a Shadow Drug Industry Tries to Avoid Regulation
Behind the Meningitis Outbreak: Pharmacies fought FDA regulation
Cry Wolf Quotes
The bill as reported jeopardizes the traditional right of self-medication and choice of remedies….The bill could very well become a handmaiden of socialized medicine.
If overcautious and restrictive Government regulation had blocked [penicillin] testing and introduction twenty years ago, some lives would have been saved while a multitude of lives would have been lost.
If the regulations go into effect, the products will be taken off the market because the manufacturers won’t take the health-claim labeling off. They are the lifeblood of the industry.
The enactment of this legislation will mean a complete readjustment, if indeed the business of manufacturing and selling packaged medicines can be continued at all. This is very doubtful.
Related Laws and Rules
Backgrounders & Briefs
Good Rules: Ten Stories Of Successful Regulation
Demos looks at ten laws and rules that we take for granted.
Resources
Consumer Federation of America defends the consumer interest in fields ranging from housing and financial services to food safety.
Alliance for A Stronger FDA tries to strengthen the Food and Drug Administration by increasing the appropriations allotted to the agency.
The Center for Science in the Public Interest, since 1971, has been a leading advocate for nutrition and health, food safety, alchohol policy, and sound science.
