By Yasmeen Abutaleb and Jarrett Renshaw
May 8 (Reuters) – The White House signed off on a plan to fire U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary, according to sources familiar with the matter, in what could be the next leadership change within the federal health department.
The Wall Street Journal earlier on Friday first reported that President Donald Trump planned to fire Makary.
Two of the sources, who are advisers to the White House, said a decision was not final. A third source close to the White House said they were told the FDA commissioner “is done” and that Trump signed off.
“President Trump has assembled the most experienced and talented administration in history, an administration that continues to focus on delivering more historic victories for the American people,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the FDA, was not immediately available for comment.
REPORTS OF MAKARY’S EXIT CIRCULATING
Over the past week, reports of Makary’s potential exit have intensified over concerns tied to controversial decisions on drug approvals, vaccines and the FDA’s handling of the abortion pill mifepristone.
Under Makary and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., thousands of employees have left the agency through firings and voluntary departures, including at the large divisions overseeing reviews of new drugs.
Leading officials have left the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health and others.
Makary, a surgical oncologist at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, was confirmed as FDA commissioner last March. He wrote bestselling books on healthcare costs and what he described as modern medicine’s failures, and has been one of the key advocates of the Make America Healthy Again movement backed by Kennedy.
(Reporting by Padmanabhan Ananthan in Bengaluru and Ahmed Aboulenein, Yasmeen Abutaleb, Bo Erickson and Jarrett Renshaw in Washington D.C.; Editing by Caroline Humer, Deepa Babington and Bill Berkrot)
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