Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"September 24, 2026 7 min read Add topic to email alerts Receive an email when new articles are posted on Please provide your email address to receive an email when new articles are posted on . ” data-action=subscribe> Subscribe We were unable to process your request. Please try again later. If you continue to have this issue please contact customerservice@slackinc.com. Back to Healio Key takeaways: Overton answered questions on vaccines, food safety, mifepristone and more. Senators on both sides of the aisle pressed the nominee for more direct answers. Senators asked Heidi Overton, MD, about some critical issues in medicine during her hearing to become FDA commissioner. If confirmed, Overton would replace Martin Makary, MD, MPH, who resigned as FDA commissioner in May. Overton is currently deputy assistant to the president for domestic policy. She previously served as a White House fellow in Trump\u2019s first term and chief policy officer and vice chair of the Center for a Healthy America at the America First Policy Institute, a conservative thinktank. Senators grilled Heidi Overton, MD, on some critical issues in medicine during her hearing to become FDA commissioner. Image: help.senate.gov Key moments At the beginning of the hearing, Committee Chairman Sen. Bill Cassidy, MD, R-La., \u2014 typically considered a swing vote in these proceedings \u2014 asked about her thoughts on the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine considering her presence behind President Donald J. Trump during the issuing of a recent executive order recommending that the U.S. reduce the number of vaccines recommended for all children. \u201cThe MMR vaccine is safe and effective,\u201d Overton replied. \u201cIf confirmed as FDA commissioner, my role would be individual product determinations and what the law requires for statutory standards of safety and efficacy. The MMR vaccine is currently licensed and approved by the FDA. It is safe and effective, and it is our best tool right now in the public health response to the measles outbreak.\u201d When asked if any vaccine on the market right now is unsafe, she said every one is \u201csafe and effective, according to the FDA.\u201d But Cassidy dug in on the point. In his opening remarks, he said that HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. gave him guarantees that he later did not follow through on. When he asked why not, Cassidy said Kennedy told him \u201copposed to keeping his promise to me, to this committee, by extension the American people, he had to do what the president told him to do.\u201d So, he pressed Overton, asking, \u201cWhen someone is saying things, alleging that the FDA was wrong in approving a drug as safe \u2014 let\u2019s assume that that someone is your boss \u2014 what is your role?\u201d \u201cWhat I would do in this role is to communicate and use my scientific training and my clinical background to describe what is currently known. And what is currently known is that the vaccines that have been approved by the FDA have met the standards for safety and efficacy,\u201d Overton said. \u201cRight now, every vaccine that is on the market has been determined to be safe and effective, and there\u2019s ongoing review.\u201d Later, senator Ed Markey, D-Ma., questioned her response here. He quoted the conservative thinktank she previously worked for in saying that Overton was \u201ccritical\u201d in the executive order. \u201cWe\u2019ve heard you and other members of the administration repeatedly champion gold standard science. At that signing, you told the country, \u2018Take a look at this scientific assessment.\u2019 And for more than 50 years, the FDA, the agency you want to run, has found the combined MMR vaccine safe and effective. You have said today that it is safe and effective,\u201d Markey said. \u201cMinutes after, the president suggested it could be \u2018quite lethal.\u2019 You had the microphone. You didn\u2019t correct him. Instead, you said parents should have \u2018the option to separate them.\u2019 So, why didn\u2019t you correct the president at that moment so that the correct science was understood by American parents?\u201d \u201cI do believe that what the president is responding to is providing additional options,\u201d Overton said. \u201c[That vaccine] is the best tool that we have. Anything new to the market would take time to develop. But … he wanted to provide an option to Americans that right now are getting zero vaccinations after COVID trust plummeted, and … he wants to provide an additional option while saying that it is safe and effective.\u201d Then, when Markey asked when FDA\u2019s science \u201cand the president\u2019s erroneous scientific claims conflict \u2014 as they did that day \u2014 which one will you defend?\u201d Overton said she would \u201cuse my clinical training, my research experience and the career expertise that is at the agency to get their input on and to take a review of all of the scientific determinations for individual products that have been determined to be safe and effective.\u201d Another important issue was food safety. In his opening remarks, Senator Bernie Sanders, I-Ve., said, \u201cIt seems like every day there\u2019s a new food product being recalled due to contamination.\u201d \u201cUnder the Trump administration, our country has experienced an unprecedented number of outbreaks of foodborne illnesses linked to healthy foods like lettuce, eggs and blueberries,\u201d Sanders said. \u201cAt the same time, the number of food facility inspections conducted overseas by FDA is down by more than 35% compared to 2019. How can we expect to make America healthy again when we have to worry about the safety of the food we eat?\u201d Senator Lisa Murkowski, R-Ak., asked about the issue later, and Overton said she is committed to \u201cmaking sure that every food safety review is to the highest standard, and communication about it is accurate.\u201d Several senators asked Overton about mifepristone. Senator Tammy Baldwin, D-Wi., laid out the safety data for mifepristone, and asked if Overton believes the drug is safe and effective. \u201cMifepristone has been approved by the FDA with the appropriate risk evaluation mitigation strategies. So, it has met the safety and efficacy determinations of the FDA for those standards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3803,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3802","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3802"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3802\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drsoniafawad.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}