The Senate voted Andrew von Eschenbach, M.D., chief of the FDA. Senators supported his nomination by a vote of 80 to 11. This decision comes after slightly over a year of Dr. von Eschenbach serving as acting head of the FDA. During that time he erased a major obstacle to his confirmation by allowing access to Plan B, the morning after pill, without a prescription.
“It is critical that the FDA again be the gold standard of drug approval,” Senator Hillary Clinton in her official statement. “By making a long overdue decision on Plan B, Dr. von Eshenbach showed encouraging signs that he will take seriously the FDA’s responsibility to put science over ideology."