Death of Fed preemption for FDA
The United States Supreme Court just handed down a decision in Wyeth v. Levine throwing out the fiction created by the Bush Administration. The spurious argument that pharmaceutical companies can dupe the under manned FDA into approving a drug or its labeling and thereby avoid civil liabilities. In a sweeping 6-3 opinion it declared such nonsense unpersuasive, reviving the rights of states to make and enforce their own civil laws and the right of citizens to seek redress in the court system. This is a banner day.
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"In short," Justice Stevens wrote, "Wyeth has not persuaded us that failure-to-warn claims like Levine's obstruct the federal regulation of drug labeling."
Justice Stevens added that "Congress has repeatedly declined to preempt state law" and that recent Bush administration changes to FDA policy claiming "that state tort suits interfere with its statutory mandate is entitled to no weight" in the Wyeth case.
