Ex-FDA chief charged in conflict of interest case

From the AP via the Houston Chronicle:

Former FDA chief Lester Crawford was charged today with lying about his ownership of stock in companies regulated by his agency.

The Justice Department accused the former head of the Food and Drug Administration with falsely reporting that he had sold stock in companies when he continued holding onto shares in the firms governed by FDA rules.

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This kind of thing is totally inevitable when the staffing pool for federal regulatory agencies consists of executives drawn from the industries that are being regulated. The whole trend started under Clinton, but, of course, it has ballooned under Bush. A couple of decades ago we had some pretty darned good oversight of industry in this country--for instance, back in the late 50s the FDA was pretty much the only agency in the world that held off on approving the sedative thalidomide, which ended up causing great masses of severe birth defects worldwide, but not in the US. Today, however, that's not the case. What were once regulatory agencies are now little corporate helpers, seeing their mission as one of enabling and aiding the industries they are required by law to police. Unfortunately, conflict-of-interest cases are not the worst possible result from this crazy-ass situation: real people get hurt and real people die when industry goes unregulated. It took over a hundred sick and three dead before Americans understood that spinach isn't safe to eat right now. If our FDA was worth a damn, that wouldn't have happened. American citizens ought not be reduced to the proverbial canary in the coal mine so that corporate fat cats can get fatter.

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