FDA Pick Was NYC Health Chief

WAPO ^ | 3/11/09 | Rob Stein and Lyndsey Layton

[anniegetyourgun]

The Obama administration has tapped Margaret A. Hamburg, a physician and former New York City health commissioner with an interest in bioterrorism, to run the struggling Food and Drug Administration, according to people familiar with the choice.

Joshua Sharfstein, Baltimore's health commissioner, will serve as Hamburg's chief deputy, according to these sources. Sharfstein won national attention when he took on the drug industry and petitioned the FDA in 2007 to restrict the use of over-the-counter cough and cold medications for young children.

[anniegetyourgun]

If you're keeping score - here is what HHS is shaping up to look like:

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius
HHS Deputy Secretary Bill Corr
HHS General Counsel Bill Schultz
CMS Administrator Don Berwick
CMS Deputy Administrator David Cutler
FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg
FDA Deputy Commissioner Joshua Sharfstein

[ottbmare]

She's the one responsible for my kids' cough and cold remedies being taken off the market? Damn her eyes, that has made my life, and theirs, much more difficult and unpleasant. But why am I surprised.