Category: Drug Prices & Regulations

I often criticize the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for being stodgy, slow to react and overly risk averse. However, the agency has an important purpose. The forerunner of the FDA dates back to the 1906 Pure Food and Drugs Act. At the time unscrupulous food manufacturers would use red dye to make spoiled beef appear fresh and used formaldehyde as a preservative to make foods last longer. Only a few years prior, Heroin was considered a wonder drug, as a treatment for morphine addiction and as a cough suppressant. Morphine was also once used as an elixir for teething pain in babies.