WASHINGTON D.C. — During a hearing to review the Fiscal Year 2025 Budget Request for the Food and Drug Administration on May 8, U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee that oversees funding for the FDA, urged FDA Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf to prioritize preparation for virus threats from livestock, inspections at infant formula facilities, and addressing illicit vaping products, and reinforced the safety of mifepristone.
Heinrich asked Califf about contamination in food and milk caused by the recent Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza outbreak, commonly known as the bird flu. Califf shared the need to prepare for the possibility of the virus jumping from animals to humans.
“We must have testing, antivirals, and we must have the vaccine,” Califf said. “We have been busy getting prepared for if the virus does mutate in a way that could jump to humans on a larger level.”
Heinrich also questioned Califf on infant formula management.
“How do you see infant formula being managed under the new human food program?” he asked.
In response to Heinrich, Califf shared how the FDA will reorganize to better respond to the needs of working families.
“We have hundreds of people across the FDA who have volunteered to be champions of change in this massive reorganization,” he said. “But, in the interim, because of the urgency of the infant formula issue, we’ve already done a lot of the work that we had to do. We now have many more people working on [...] science and regulation that needs to go on. All of the infant formula facilities are being inspected at least once a year and in the case of the Abbott plant, there is a consent decree, so we are essentially there every day.”
Finally, Heinrich questioned Califf on FDA’s lack of urgency to roll out vaping regulations.
“Why are we not making faster progress on regulating the incredible number of unapproved vaping products that are on the market?” he asked.
Califf voiced his own frustrations.
“I’m as frustrated as you are with it,” he said. “Just as we’re getting a handle on the basics of vaping [..] .along comes the Chinese manufacturing of vaping products and the overwhelming vaping products now used by American youth and getting addicted is made in China .... Here we have products that are not legal to sell to Chinese people in China, made in China, and imported into the U.S. in large numbers .... If we take our 1,400 investigators, i.e. inspectors, and try to have them manage 300,000 vaping establishments, that math doesn’t work. So, we’ve got to stop this at the point of import.”
By Sen. Martin Henirich
