Information about the Aspen Ideas Festival is here. I am scheduled for a session, The American Wellness Paradox, currently scheduled from 11:00-11:50 a.m., at the East Lawn Tent. This will be a discussion with senior HHS policy advisor, Calley Means. Here’s the blurb on it: “Americans are spending more than ever on healthcare, supplements, wellness trends, and “clean eating,” yet rates of chronic disease and metabolic illness continue to climb. As skepticism fuels the rise of movements like MAHA, debates over what Americans should eat have become deeply cultural, political, and economic. Two influential voices with sharply different perspectives on nutrition and food science explore how food systems, farming practices, consumer culture, and the wellness industry collided to create one of the defining public health debates of our time.”
What’s going on with the FDA? And MAHA?
Food Fix broke the news: Jim Jones, FDA Deputy Commissioner for Human Foods , resigned saying that the firings of the staff he had recruited over the last year made his job impossible.
The New York Times quotes Jones.
They’ve created a real pickle for themselves,” by cutting staff members working on a key priority, Mr. Jones said. “You just can’t do an assessment [of food additives] for free and you can’t ban chemicals by fiat.
But wait! Maybe you can.
The FDA is an agency of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). And that brings me to its new secretary’s astonishing opening statement on his first day on the job.
I’m totally for making chronic disease a national priority for intervention, for getting conflicts of interest out of the FDA, and for focusing on child health. And for Making America Healthy Again (MAHA).
I am eager to see what he does.
The FDA has long been plagued by cumbersome procedures (many of which do protect the public), conflicts of interest (especially the “revolving door” between the agency and industry), and apparent capture by the industries it is supposed to regulate.
Can RFK Jr address those problems in a way that promotes the public interest? We shall see.
In the meantime, Jim Jones is being replaced by Kyle Diamantas, a lawyer from the large firm, Jones Day.
Not much is known about Mr. Diamantas, beyond his hunting turkeys with President Trump.
Food Fix quotes Vani Hari, the Food Babe as saying Diamantas “has a lot of Big Food contacts…I think that actually serves him. It puts him in an interesting position because he understands the stakeholders at play….I think that puts him in a good position to figure this out…He gets this issue.”
The nominee to be the new FDA Commissioner, Martin Makary, has not yet been confirmed.
So much remains uncertain. I am following all this with great interest.
Update on the chaos
The FDA has now rehired some of the people who were fired (particularly those supported by user fees). Presumably, Jim Jones remains out.
