Public Health
FDA’s Worrisome Proposal on Toxins in Food Additives
Part of it is a move in the right direction. But one provision raises serious questions.
According to the Guardian news site, a proposed new FDA regulation will “expand a controversial loophole to allow some of the world’s most toxic chemicals to be added directly to food without a safety review.” The proposed regulation does two other, seemingly reasonable, things along with the one that raises real concerns. The worrisome …
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CONTINUE READINGOpening Shots in a War on Doctors
What began as a war on science has now reached your kid’s doctor.
The doctors we all rely on have now joined liberals and journalists as enemies of the people. RFK, Jr., is excited about eliminating “medical tyranny” by replacing doctors with AI. Texas AG Ken Paxton is investigating all the state’s pediatricians for misconduct. Medical associations are under fire. Fanning the flames of distrust for modern medicine has real consequences. We saw that Monday when the Governor of New York was forced to declare an emergency over the spread of measles, a disease once thought to be extinct in the United States.
CONTINUE READINGMontana’s Human Experiment with Untested Drugs
The state has decided to allow experimental drugs to be used on anyone who can pay for them.
Montana has opened a channel for drugs to be sold without the normal requirements of testing for effectiveness and side effects.
CONTINUE READINGOMB’s New Grant Regulations: A Deeper Dive
A close look at OMB’s proposed rule only heightens concerns.
Is OMB’s proposed rewrite of federal grant regulations as bad as it sounds? Sadly, the answer is yes. Below, this posts takes a close look at some key provisions in the regulations. Some raise constitutional problems. Others are merely bad policy, undermining merit review, deterring valuable research, and skewing research toward the politics of the moment.
CONTINUE READINGBending Under Pressure
Every now and then, the Trump Administration shows signs of reluctantly giving in to reality.
The Trump Administration’s basic stance has been to pursue ideological purity all costs, beginning with the “shock and awe” campaign of the first year. Don’t expect miracles, but there are at least a few signs that the Administration is tempering that strategy. It’s a bit comforting to see indications that reality is slowly sinking in. It’s also evidence that resistance to Trump policies isn’t futile.
Any trend toward saner policies is likely to be very limited. For instance, Trump and his supporters are too invested in climate denial to ever admit that climate change is a serious problem. The best we might hope for is that they ease up just a little on their war against clean energy. There are at least some hints that this may be starting to happen.
CONTINUE READINGNoem’s Disastrous Reign at FEMA
The post-Noem agency is in desperate need of rebuilding.
It’s going to be very difficult for a new DHS head to shift course given the message coming from the White House. But without a change in the direction, a weaker FEMA will increase the country’s vulnerability to the disaster risks posed by an increasingly unruly climate. Noem has done great damage to FEMA, leaving the country more vulnerable to disasters. Trump’s desire to abolish the agency isn’t helping. Among her failings, her damage to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) may not be the worst, but it’s far from the least. Restoring the FEMA will be a major undertaking and a heavy lift in an administration best known for agency destruction.
CONTINUE READINGThe Accelerating Decline of U.S. Public Health Policy
Just when we get over our shock over one development, another comes along.
It’s hard to believe how quickly a science-driven approach to protecting health has been replaced by ideology and quackery. Lack of expertise is now seen as a plus in making decisions, and the Administration is actively seeking to suppress information about problems that it would rather not address. I posted a month ago about the current evidence-free approach to health policy, Things have only gotten since then. It’s been one bad thing after another. All of this in only a month. There are 34 months left in Trump’s presidency, so you can only imagine how dangerous the situation will be by the time he leaves office.
CONTINUE READINGMAHA’s Evidence-Free Health Policy
No matter how good your intentions, ignoring the evidence is a recipe for disaster.
It seems plain that key health agencies are now in the hands of earnest, well-meaning people who, unfortunately, don’t know what they’re talking about. For example, the CDC’s advisory committee on vaccines is largely composed of anti-vaxxers. When the committee recently decided to eliminate a recommendation for Hepatitis B vaccines, none of the speakers who addressed the committee, and no one on the task force assigned to investigate the question, was an expert on the disease.
CONTINUE READINGIs This the End of Cost-Benefit Analysis?
Trump’s EPA is effectively abandoning economic analysis
Maybe the Administration means to keep cost-benefit analysis in place for some other kinds of regulations at EPA or elsewhere. But if the courts uphold the EPA’s refusal to quantify the enormous harms caused by air pollution, it’s hard to see an argument for quantifying many other regulatory benefits. In other settings, environmentalists might applaud the repeal of cost-benefit analysis. In the current setting, however, the purpose is all too plain: to make it easier for the Administration to ignore the ways it is endangering human life and health.
CONTINUE READINGThat Was the Year That Was
2025 had a lot of bad environmental news, but also a few rays of hope.
2025 has been a dark time for Americanswho care about the environment. Rather than being a repeat of his first term, which had been bad enough environmentally, Trump’s second term has been a tsunami of bad news. Besides some outright rollbacks, Trump has done his best to purge the government of programs and people implementing environmental law. Much of that has been illegal but effective anyway. The demolition of the East Wing will be remembered as a defining moment, the perfect metaphor for an Administration that has religiously embraced the motto, “move fast and break things.”
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