Makary’s embrace of ideology, conspiracies puts FDA at risk: A Perspective

FDA Commissioner Marty Makary’s endorsement of debunked conspiracy theories, his public coziness with pharmaceutical executives, and his promotion of medical claims unsupported by evidence would be troubling under any circumstances. They are a five-alarm fire now because, in a sharp break from precedent, he is personally making regulatory decisions that carry profound public health consequences — and he is linking approvals to political drug pricing deals, onshoring investments, and the Make America Healthy Again ideology.

Makary was speaking with a podcaster a few days before Thanksgiving when he claimed Lyme disease was cooked up in a U.S. government lab, throwing in the specter of mad Nazi scientists to propel his comments into the memesphere. He tossed in a claim that AIDS “could have come from a lab in Africa” for good measure. ...