Bipartisan Group of Senators Says FDA Needs More Funding Than Bush Administration Has Proposed

A bipartisan group of senators on Tuesday during a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing said the Bush administration's proposed fiscal 2009 budget increase for FDA is insufficient for the agency to adequately function amid rising costs and a growing need for more staff, the New York Times reports.

President Bush in his budget proposed increasing FDA's allocated budget by 3% to about $1.8 billion. The Senate last month passed a budget resolution that would increase FDA's 2009 allocated budget by $375 million over this year, a 20% increase.

Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) -- chair of the Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration and Related Agencies -- said, "To us, it's clear that they're seriously underfunded." According to the Times, Sen. Bob Bennett (R-Utah), the subcommittee's ranking minority member, attempted to get FDA Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach to "say how much more the agency could use wisely." Bennett asked von Eschenbach that if lawmakers found that the Bush administration "was wrong and you needed to add another $100 million, just to pull a number completely out of the air, could you handle that?"

Von Eschenbach said that he would "welcome an opportunity to present a scenario of portfolio options" for funding. However, he added that he did not think the agency would be able to absorb $375 million in additional funding in one year.

A 2007 report by a panel of outside advisers said that FDA lacked the funding, staff and scientific expertise to adequately protect American lives. In addition, von Eschenbach last month said FDA "may fail in its mission to protect and promote the health of every American," adding that "peril exists."

However, the Times reports that he was "far less pessimistic" in his testimony on Tuesday. Von Eschenbach said, "I believe we have been eminently successful up to this period of time," adding, "We are the world's gold standard. But if we want to continue that level of excellence, we must change."

He announced plans for the agency to add up to 700 new employees but said that without changes to Bush's proposed FDA budget, the agency would be unable to hire new employees in 2009. "We are on a trajectory to increased staff. We just have to push it off a little," he said (Harris, New York Times, 4/16).