Will the new FDA fix the old FDA?

A string of scandals in recent decades has led to sharp criticism of the relationship between the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and pharmaceutical and medical device companies. In more recent years the agency has increasingly granted provisional approval for drugs based on promises from manufacturers that they will show their drugs work after they are on the market. 1

Over two and half years we conducted an investigation, published in The Lever, reviewing all new drug approvals from 2013 to 2022. 2 As part of our investigation a panel of four experts reviewed all 429 new drug approvals over that 10 year period. Martin Makary, who is now the commissioner of the FDA under US health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, was initially a coauthor of the investigation.

The FDA states tha