US FDA HQ Plan costs revised down

The US Food and Drug Administration's proposed budget for its nine-year campus consolidation project has now been brought down to $810 million from a level of $890 million at the start of the year (Marketletter January 9), and massively below the first estimates of $1.4 billion announced in 1990.

FDA Commissioner David Kessler told a House hearing that the reductions had been achieved by the agency and the General Services Administration going "back and back again to ensure that the project is the most efficient it can be and to cut things that we don't need." He also assured the hearing that the current project, as outlined, "will meet FDA's needs well into the 21st century."