Trump and Dr. Oz teamed up to pressure FDA into skipping tests, pushing ineffective drugs

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/8/24/2118542/-Donald-Trump-and-Dr-Oz-teamed-up-to-pressure-FDA-into-skipping-tests-pushing-ineffective-drugs

Of course they did. The Washington Post is reporting that a report from a House panel investigating the botched response to the pandemic has already turned up some extremely alarming facts. Facts like how Donald Trump pressured the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to skip safety tests so that vaccines could roll out before Election Day. And how both Trump and now-Senate candidate Mehmet Oz pushed the agency to promote drugs that did not work.

Staffers at the FDA tried to point out that not only would cutting back on phase III testing violate the agency’s rules and possibly result in distributing an unsafe product, it could also lead to exactly the kind of public distrust in vaccines that was already spreading among Republicans. And, for once, the public would have had a good reason.

Former FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn also tried to point out something else: None of this would be secret. The process by which vaccines go through phase I, phase II, and phase III testing is highly consistent. The manufacturers had already made information on the initial rounds public, and it was already known when the final phase would be complete. If the FDA had moved faster, they either would been forced to line up their panel of experts and ask them to approve medication for which the results were not yet in, or simply overturn all their processes. Either way, it would have been “obviously reported, and would further reduce vaccine confidence.”

The pressure campaign from Trump came as he and his allies were already spreading rumors and accusations about figures like National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Anthony Fauci. Officials inside the FDA complained that Trump’s attacks on the agency and scientists left “lingering scars” and punched holes in not only trust for the vaccines, but in public health officials at every level.

*snip*