Extra funding for US FDA welcomed

The late addition of $186.0 million to the 2008 budget for the US Food and Drug Administration has been welcomed by a variety of groups, following earlier reports that the initially-proposed $1.70 billion appropriation was inadequate for the agency to meet the full range of its regulatory responsibilities (Marketletter July 23). The move by the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture followed lobbying by both its Chairman, Senator Herb Kohl (Democrat, Wisconsin) and ranking member, Sen Bob Bennett (Republican, Utah).

The FDA Alliance, a coalition of over 100 organizations and individuals (including six former FDA Commissioners), previously argued that the funding level, including drugmakers' user fees, should have been $2.0 billion in the next fiscal year, to return the FDA's spending level to that of 2003. However, despite the relatively small shift in the proposed regulatory agency's budget to $1.76 billion, the FDA Alliance called the shift "a step in the right direction." In a statement, the group noted that the 12% spending increase is equivalent to that of the previous three fiscal years combined.

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