Imaging industry lobbying group criticizes FDA staffing cuts

A key imaging industry lobbying group is criticizing recent staffing cuts at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. 

STAT first reported news of the firings, with the list including the FDA’s head of medical device safety. Another 10 of the 40 staffers tasked with reviewing imaging devices also were on the chopping block, along with 40 on a team tied to AI research. 

The Advanced Medical Technology Association on Feb. 18 responded to the reported firings.  AdvaMed—which represents key players in imaging including GE HealthCare, Hologic, Philips, and Siemens Healthineers—said these cuts could negatively impact patient care. 

“FDA was already struggling to keep pace with our industry’s tens of thousands of new medical technology applications every year, all of which are intended to improve the lives of patients in this country,” AdvaMed President and CEO Scott Whitaker wrote in a letter shared on social media Tuesday. “Unfortunately, as a result of these reductions, FDA will lose hundreds of new employees, the best and most innovative hires under our most recent [user fee] agreement,” he added later. 

Whitaker cited artificial intelligence as an example of the potential ramifications. Such technology is helping to drive earlier and more accurate diagnoses, resulting in lower costs and better outcomes. However, reducing the agency’s manpower could hinder this progress. 

“Eliminating FDA’s recent critical new hires in the AI space will dramatically slow review times and require reassigning non-experts already at FDA to review these technologies who will inevitably make slower and potentially inappropriately conservative decisions,” Whitaker wrote. 

AdvaMed wants a chance to work with newly confirmed HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy to “reverse these cuts” and find other ways to achieve spending reductions. 

“These cuts were planned before Secretary Kennedy was even sworn into office. I am sure this latest action would not align with his goal of making America healthy again,” Whitaker said. 

Many of the laid off employees were reportedly in their initial probationary periods. A former official expressed concern the FDA is cutting out vital new hires who are needed to keep the agency running. 

“You want to bring in new blood,” Peter Pitts, a former FDA associate commissioner under President George W. Bush, told the Associated Press. “You want people with new ideas, greater enthusiasm and the latest thinking in terms of technology.”