{"id":266600,"date":"2026-02-04T04:30:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T04:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/266600\/"},"modified":"2026-02-04T04:30:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T04:30:09","slug":"marty-makary-addresses-staff-concerns-over-drug-voucher-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/266600\/","title":{"rendered":"Marty Makary addresses staff concerns over drug voucher program"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON \u2014 At an employee town hall on Tuesday, Food and Drug Administration leaders tried to quell staff and external concerns about a controversial new program to fast-track certain drugs.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis pilot is an effort to make our review processes patient-centric,\u201d said Mallika Mundkur, deputy chief medical officer and leader of the new drug review program, according to a recording obtained by STAT. \u201cEven getting a truly transformative therapy out to them a month earlier could potentially lead to decades of life for that patient.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The program, called the Commissioner\u2019s National Priority Voucher, launched in June and allows the FDA to grant one- to two-month reviews to companies that prove their drugs \u201calign with national priorities.\u201d It has come under fire both internally and externally for allowing political officials to interfere with the drug review process, STAT <a href=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/2025\/12\/19\/fda-voucher-program-political-interference\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">previously reported<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"restricted-text\">STAT+ Exclusive Story<\/p>\n<p class=\"restricted-login\">Already have an account? <a href=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/login\/\" data-stat-login=\"\" data-stat-paywall-cta=\"breaker login cta\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Log in<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"restricted-content-breaker-bg\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/stat-plus-breaker-bg.png\" alt=\"STAT+\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/stat-plus\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"stat-plus-logo\" src=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/themes\/stat\/images\/stat-plus-logo-white.svg\" alt=\"STAT+\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\tThis article is exclusive to STAT+ subscribers<br \/>\n\t\t\t\tUnlock this article \u2014 plus in-depth analysis, newsletters, premium events, and news alerts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"restricted-content-breaker-wrapper-cta mobile\">Already have an account? <a href=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/login\/\" data-stat-login=\"\" data-stat-paywall-cta=\"breaker login cta mobile\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Log in<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\tIndividual plans<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\tGroup plans<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/stat-plus\/\" class=\"stat-button view-all\" data-stat-paywall-cta=\"breaker view all plans\" aria-label=\"View All Plans\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">View All Plans<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"restricted-content-text\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\tTo read the rest of this story subscribe to STAT+.\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/stat-plus\/\" class=\"stat-button restricted-button\" data-stat-paywall-cta=\"breaker subscribe cta 1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Subscribe<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 At an employee town hall on Tuesday, Food and Drug Administration leaders tried to quell staff&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":266601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[14819,525,134,524,111,139,69,1676],"class_list":{"0":"post-266600","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-drug-development","9":"tag-fda","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-medication","12":"tag-new-zealand","13":"tag-newzealand","14":"tag-nz","15":"tag-stat"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=266600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=266600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=266600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=266600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}