Top FDA official says the agency is bowing to Big Pharma

The Food and Drug Administration is succumbing to Big Pharma's influence to keep approving lucrative opioids despite the toll they're taking on American lives, a top official at the agency claims.

Dr Raeford Brown, chair of the FDA's committee for reviewing opioid approvals, told the Guardian the agency is having a 'direct impact on the mortality rate from opioids in this country' by continuing to approve new high-risk drugs.

His words come after the FDA approved a controversial new opioid, Dsuvia, despite its own board of physicians warning the drug is easy to abuse and could cause more deaths.

Dr Brown was one of a number of committee members who, he claims, we deliberately barred from voting on Dsuvia because the in-person vote was scheduled for the same day as a conference that most of them were attending.

The drug's manufacturers and the FDA claim that, since the drug will mainly be administered by doctors in hospital settings, there is a low risk of it reaching the streets.

But Dr Brown warns sufentanil is already known to be abused by doctors and having hospitals as the gatekeeper is no sure-fire way to prevent it reaching the black market.

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