Coalition launches campaign to increase the FDA's budget
Group says money would help speed drugs to market
WASHINGTON -- A group called the Coalition for a Stronger FDA yesterday launched a campaign to boost the Food and Drug Administration's budget.
The group's lobbying effort includes biotechnology manufacturers, food producers, patient advocates, former FDA leaders, and three former secretaries of Health and Human Services.
The FDA, with a fiscal year 2007 budget of $1.8 billion , regulates food, drugs, cosmetics, medical devices, veterinary, and other goods that represent about 25 cents of every dollar consumers spend in the United States.
But in a press conference yesterday, coalition members said the $1.5 billion in funding that Congress appropriated for the FDA lags far behind the $5.8 billion allocated to its sister health agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention . Another agency, the National Institutes of Health, will receive $28.5 billion in fiscal year 2007 .
The Coalition for a Stronger FDA 's plans to lobby for more FDA funding were announced days after a scathing report by independent scientists said that chronic underfunding contributes to the agency's lax oversight of drug safety.
James Greenwood , a former US representative who is now chief executive of the Biotechnology Industry Organization , outlined the lobbying effort during a recent visit to Boston . As part of the campaign, Tommy G. Thompson , immediate past Health and Human Services secretary , and a biotechnology lobbyist soon will meet with the director of the federal Office of Management and Budget to discuss funding for the FDA's fiscal year 2008 budget. If the group can't obtain more money from the White House, its next step is to lobby Congress.
Whether the funding pitch is to made to members of Congress or directly to the White House, both ``are going to be difficult, because dollars are in short supply," Thompson said.
Even if the FDA's budget was doubled, the investment would pay for itself if it sped life-saving drugs to market just one year earlier or averted a public health crisis, like the recent illnesses and at least one death linked to fresh spinach, said William Hubbard , a former FDA associate commissioner .
``We realize it's going to take a nice, sizeable increase," Thompson said, but added that the group hasn't settled on a figure.
In a report released Friday , the Institute of Medicine , which advises the government on health matters, recommended Congress appropriate more money for the FDA.
If that appears unlikely, it said, spending restrictions on user fees the industry pays to the FDA should be loosened to further fund drug safety oversight.
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, the pharmaceutical industry's trade association, said in a statement that a decision whether to join the Coalition for a Stronger FDA is ``still under consideration." It also has not decided whether to endorse redirecting user fees to help improve drug safety.
Diedtra Henderson can be reached at dhenderson@globe.com. 
