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House panel proposes big cuts to FDA budget
The Food and Drug Administration would take an 11.5 percent budget cut under a spending bill that House appropriators released Monday.
The Appropriations Committee released its 2012 spending bill for the FDA and the Agriculture Department ahead of a subcommittee vote scheduled for Tuesday. The FDA would lose roughly $285 million.
Only part of the agency’s funding comes from Congress. It also collects fees from the drug and medical device industries, which pay the agency to review new products for approval. With those fees included, the total FDA budget next year would be $3.7 billion.
A coalition of industry and consumer groups fought during the last years of the Bush administration to significantly increase FDA spending, following a high-profile series of food and drug contaminations.
The Appropriations Committee noted that the proposed cut to the FDA is smaller than the total cut across all programs funded under the same spending bill.
