Heidi Overton, a top White House aide, has been picked to lead the Food and Drug Administration, President Donald Trump announced Wednesday. Dr.
Overton has been critical of abortion pills and, if confirmed, would be positioned to roll back FDA rules that made them more accessible. Overton is a medical doctor and deputy director of the White House Domestic Policy Council who has worked on several of Trump’s second-term health initiatives. She has become a trusted administration figure and a champion of the Republican president’s goals. Referring to a “Dr. U.S. abortion opponents have expressed frustration that the administration has not acted to stem the flow of such pills prescribed online, a situation they view as undermining state abortion bans. Days before Makary’s departure, the agency opened the door to allowing more unauthorized electronic cigarettes and nicotine pouches onto the U.S. market, in a policy change that essentially bypassed FDA staff experts.
Heidi” in a Truth Social post, Trump said Overton was a smart and respected “rockstar” who would deliver on his priorities of faster cures, innovation, lower drug prices and more wins for Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again” movement. In recent months, she has appeared with the president to announce major projects, including some of his “most favored nation” deals with drug companies to lower prices to those of other developed countries and his recent vaccine order that sought to split the combined measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine into three separate immunizations — against the advice of medical groups.
MAHA has high expectations of next FDA head
Under Kennedy, the FDA has set up extra hurdles for vaccine testing and blocked the publication of research into the effectiveness of COVID-19 shots. Kennedy stood by Trump recently as the president signed the executive order aimed at upending childhood vaccinations in the U.S. despite unprecedented financial and logistical challenges. The FDA also has an ongoing review of widely used antidepressants, including whether they may increase the risk of autism and other disorders when used during pregnancy. The medicines have long been a target of Kennedy, who was a leader in the anti-vaccine movement before joining the government.
