FDA. Do you trust them ?

[lukertin]

As long as there are corporate lobbyists, the government is compromised to the interests of corporation and cannot be trusted to be non partial when it comes to corporations.

Actually, the FDA is pretty insulated from effects of the political process, since the only 'employee' of the FDA that changes with elections is the FDA Commissioner, who really isn't involved in the everyday operations of FDA agents. They can issue a general policy concerns because that is their job, like when the Patent Commissioner said "Relax standards of patent allowance" did around 2008, or when the DEA no longer pursued marijuana investigations into the operations of dispensers of medical marijuana starting in 2008 (coinciding with Obama's election), but they do not, and cannot, issue sweeping reforms---Congress does.

 

The whole point of an administration like the FDA is that it is as unaffected as possible by the political process. Virtually all employees are hired on the basis of merit within the competitive federal employment process (as opposed to appointment), making the effects of any corporate lobbying for candidate campaigns on agencies like the FDA effectively zero. Yes, this leaves the possibility of bribery open (probably the reason behind the aspartame for stevia blacklist), pretty much all agencies have independent appeal boards, minimizing effects of impropriety.

 

Company shows EDITED lab results to FDA. (who are bureaucrats, NOT scientists....)

I thought it was pertinent to point out that while FDA employees are 'bureaucrats', the majority of them have undergraduate or graduate degrees in the relevant sciences; it is in fact, a job requirement.

 

A cursory search of job requirements within the FDA shows that this is the case: http://jobsearch.usajobs.gov/search.aspx?q=FDA&where=&x=0&y=0&brd=3876&vw=b&FedEmp=N&FedPub=Y

 

FDA approves drug for human use.

 

5 to 10 years later, same drug is found to have side affects associated with long-term use. Generally, these side affects are worse than what the drugs were designed to treat.

That's not really the FDA's fault. What do you expect the FDA to do? Mandate generation-long testing of drug use to study the effects of the drug in the long term, as well as potential congenital effects on offspring? How practical is that? It already takes an extremely long time to bring a drug to market, forcing another 50-60 yrs on drug testing does not benefit anyone; in fact, imposing this sort of requirement would lead to an immediate collapse of the entire pharmaceutical industry within the US because no investor is going to wait around for his grandchildren to grow up before he begins to see a return on an extremely risky investment.

 

Todays "wonder drug" is tomorrows class-action lawsuit......

Just because some lawsuit is filed does not mean the lawsuit has any merit...

 

I don't trust the FDA. I don't believe for one moment the Nutritional "Facts" you can find on food products either, since legal trickery is used to trick people who don't look closely enough. For example, certain cans of soda. What makes up a serving? Half the can. Who drinks HALF a can of soda? No caffeine in your drink? Ah! But they don't have to tell you about the ingredients which naturally contain that caffeine. Think your product has no calories per serving? If there's a decimal, companies are allowed to round that decimal down. If it's 0.9, it's written as 0. So be careful with those sauces.

 

I pretty much don't trust anyone in these positions anymore. I leave it up to me to decide what's good and right for me. Doctors prescribing all sorts of drugs and making money off of it, vets doing the same thing, FDA approving harmful products and then not being held responsible when its harming people. I sound kind of cynical, but I'm not wrong. At least not with the stuff in my area.

Besides the fact that I haven't seen a single soda can wherein the nutritional facts were divided upon numerous servings (I have a vending machine bag of doritos in front of me right now, there is no 'massaging' of the nutritional facts by changing the number of servings contained in a 50g bag of unhealthy snack food, either), how is your concern relevant at all? No nutritional information is going to be determinative, or have an expectation of high levels of accuracy. They are by nature, prone to inaccuracy, in fact, accuracy is impossible to achieve. Calorie listings are already done in tens (I find your allegation of decimals in Calorie listings highly disingenuous), which basically means any figure has a +/- 9 error, a bag of chips with 260 calories might be 251, it might be 269, that's a 7% variance and totally legit; if a butcher were to take a cow and serve the cow as steak to 100 different people, do you think each steak is going to have the exact same nutritional value? Do you think companies in the same position should be forced to individual nutritional facts on this basis, when they use cows from different farms across the world?

 

So what if companies are allowed to round the decimal down, (by the way, packages of tic-tacs and sugared gum contain statements such as "1 serving contains less than [fraction] of a calorie") You gain a gram of protein here, you'll lose it somewhere else. Big deal.

 

Aside: doctors get unofficial kickbacks from companies for prescribing their drug. This does not happen in a black box. They prescribe drug X, instead of drug Y or A or B because the manufacturer of drug X gave the doctor an open bar at some conference, doctors aren't prescribing drugs for no reason (at least not the extent you make it out to be). They have a choice amongst the various medications in the market, and in the case of prescription drugs, you as the patient, are a consumer removed from the marketing process. Maybe this is a bad practice, but consumers can't be expected to make decisions based on highly technical research data; that's what a doctor is for, it's what a regulatory agent employed by the FDA with a pharmaceutical degree is for, it's what a research scientist employed by a company is for.

Edited October 4, 2011 by lukertin

[everybodysop]

Meh.. They have way too many "funding influences" to be trusted as if they have only the health of the people in mind. (Racopamine and Aspartame? Really?)

[Beriallord]

11 Totally Disgusting Things the FDA Allows In Your Food

 

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-20013038-10391704.html

 

No I don't trust the FDA.

[Marxist ßastard]

11 Totally Disgusting Ways to Generate Pageviews

Let's try a role-playing exercise. You're the FDA – the entire FDA. You're in a totally empty rectangular room of 400 ft². The ceiling seems a bit lower than normal. Below the floor, you can hear the splashing of the DREAD CANDIRU. You see a BRAYING JACKASS emerge from a crevice (the room is a cave). You fail your initiative roll. The BRAYING JACKASS shouts, “The FDA allows 8 rat feces in every 10 grams of ground marjoram!”

 

Upon inspection of your records, you find that you do randomly inspect certain foods under a microscope for “rodent filth,” mainly hair fragments that entered grinding machinery via dust. Most samples have no such contamination, but rarely you find one that does and you work with the facility to make sure it doesn't happen again. For consistency's sake, you also make firm limits above which you start a more formal corrective process that may include shutting the whole facility down. Apparently the BRAYING JACKASS thinks you and Big Marjoram conspire to keep rats near their grinding machines at all times, just close enough that they barely avoid facility shutdowns.

 

To appease the BRAYING JACKASS, you could:

 

• 
   
  
• Lower the limits. This doesn't really do anything helpful, since you can (and do) already take action against unsanitary facilities, no matter what inspections come up with. It simply gives you fewer choices in the matter. Meanwhile, the BRAYING JACKASS just shouts, “The FDA allows 5 rat feces in every 10 grams of ground marjoram!”
   
  
• Set all the limits to 1. Then if you find anything you must start the formal corrective process – even if the facility is otherwise perfect. Everyone will live in fear that somewhere in the day's product, there's something that looks like a rodent hair fragment, and it'll be in a random sample picked by the FDA. Still, the BRAYING JACKASS shouts, “The FDA allows up to 1 rat fex in every 10 grams of ground marjoram!”
   
  
• Remove the limits. This sweeps your non-problem under the rug. But now there's less accountability, and you have nothing to justify any action (or inaction) you decide upon. So depending on the week, the BRAYING JACKASS shouts, “The FDA finds rat feces and does nothing!” or “The FDA gestapo shuts down small businesses for no reason!”
   
  
• Stop inspections. That is, don't check for rodent filth at all. This is a bad solution for everyone involved. But if you don't do your job, the BRAYING JACKASS won't tell you all the things you're doing wrong!

[Beriallord]

Lets say for example, someone has 4 tons of corn, and a rats nest and a few grams of turds were found in that 4 ton pile of corn. I blame the ones storing the corn for not keeping it in more secure controlled environments, and would classify the entire load of corn contaminated and unsuitable for human consumption. According to the FDA you are allowed so many rat turds in that pile of corn. According to me, that pile of corn is contaminated and unsuitable for human consumption. It doesn't mean it will be wasted, just sell it as horse feed. Edited November 25, 2011 by Beriallord

[brokenergy]

I trust them as much as I trust the EU version or the Aus version. It really depends on how you view things but I like to point out that you could never prove a product being 100% safe and you can't really do long term studies on humans as it costs too much money. Therefore, scientists do as much tests on smaller test subjects (which are mice) as much as possible and then perform several human trials. If successful then it is sent to the FDA (or the EU version) where they look at all the papers and base their choice from there. From every single one that is approved, there are at least 30 which have to summit more evidence or are rejected.

 

In point I like to highlight that nothing is 100% safe or effective. It is not practical in the real world.