Shortly after Andy von Eschenbach went out of his way to say very little at an industry conference at the Hyatt Regency in Washington, DC, a group of former FDA commissioners spoke at a panel at George Washington University.

Among them was David Kessler, who believes it was inevitable that there would be an increase in serious side effects from many new heavily promoted drugs because of the pharmaceutical industry’s push to create blockbusters. Remember, Kessler didn’t like DTC advertising.

“The notion that you can come up with a new drug and have millions and millions of people take it safely - the blockbuster - that is what got us in trouble,” Kessler lamented, according to The Star-Ledger of New Jersey. He then added that the blockbuster model isn’t sustainable and suggested that “limits should be placed” on marketing medicines as “just another commodity.”

Joining Kessler during the panel discussion were Donald Kennedy, Frank Young and Jane Henney. They all expressed unhappiness that the FDA’s integrity and credibility has been under attack and atributed the problems to a lack of consistent and sustained leadership, a paucity of resources and insufficient power to deal with safety issues.

Young seemed to sum up the mood, though, when he said: “The FDA needs to be a high priority for the administration and the Congress, and the administration must avoid political meddling.”

Since von Eschenbach is a Bush family friend, there must be some immunity from politics, yes?

[tags]Andrew von Eschenbach, David Kessler, FDA, Frank Young[/tags]