Seems like a good introduction to the basic issues, but it fails to consider many other options as to how to solve the problem. I suspect that there are quite a few additional points of view to include in the mix.

As a physician, I find this article very frightening, especially on top of the known problems with Chinese ingredients for toothpaste, which killed children in several countries and with animal food ingredients, as well as previous human deaths that German researchers associated with a Chinese generic version of gentamicin. The FDA has recently had problems monitoring drugs after what would, in the days when we avoided the problems much of the world had with Thalidomide, have been considered too-early approval. The story is favorably reviewed in a Consumer Reports blog, as well as others. I hope that we return to the days when the FDA tried harder to protect us from harmful drugs.

The facts are there, or so it seems, but the "angle" is typical of the newspaper: the problem is stated in the headline, which begins with "FDA." It is, according to the reporter, the FDA's fault that China and India are getting away with corrupt, unprincipled trade practices. The WaPo's lunatic solution is to increase US taxes to pay the costs of doing for China and India the routine things those nations refuse to do. -- It's grisly: taxing the US citizenry to clean up the criminally irresponsible foreign drug industry is just a subsidy of greedy, unprincipled Asian manufacturers. Worse, it will never result in genuine reform and reliability. As soon as the inspectors leave, the criminals will be right back at it. That's the ... More »