Alliance Seeks Input on FDA Budget

Do You Support the Administration’s Priorities Or Suggest Others?

The Alliance supports the President’s FY 24 Request for FDA, which includes a $372 million increase in BA funding. When we announced that, we added:

“We will be reviewing the detailed budget request to provide additional information about the strengths of the request and any areas in which we think additional emphasis is needed."

We ask Alliance members to review the summary below—and the full Request to which there are links—and provide us with feedback.

Do you agree with the Administration’s choice of where and how much to allocate to specific areas of need? Do you think that there are additional programs where monies are needed on a priority basis? Send your comments to sgrossman@strengthenfda.org.

We suggest starting with the FDA Fiscal Year 2024 Justification of Estimates for Appropriations Committees (aka the Congressional Justification or CJ).  The Administration’s clearest illustration of its FY 24 spending priorities for FDA can be found in a table which appears on page 6.  Pages 7-11 have a further discussion of each line item.

Under the President’s FY 24 Budget Request, food, nutrition, and cosmetics would gain $133.2 million, of which $88 million is for new program initiatives. The monies requested for FY 24 for food and nutrition programs are based on needs-based assessments made last summer; any monies needed for the proposed program restructuring will be in the FY 25 budget.

The most notable bump is $64 million for Healthy and Safe Food for All. These monies are intended to modernize oversight of infant formula, empower consumers to make healthier food choices, reduce exposure to toxic chemicals, and implement new regulatory authorities for both cosmetics and dietary supplements.

Also significant is the $37 million increase for programs to implement the New Era for Smarter Food Safety initiative, bringing the program from $3 million in FY 23 to a proposed $40 million in FY 24. In addition, $12 million is proposed as an investment in improved nutrition and food labeling, and $5 for initial implementation of cosmetics safety reform.

Advancing safe and effective medical products is slated to gain $98.2 million, of which more than two-thirds is allocated to increases in opioid anti-addiction programs and to reigniting the Cancer Moonshot.

The remaining $140.5 in proposed increases—strengthening agency capacity and addressing infrastructure needs--are allocated to cross-cutting agency purposes. Both food safety and medical products will benefit from these monies.

The bulk of these cross-cutting monies ($105.3 million) is for cost of living salary increases for FY 23 and FY 24. The remainder will go to enhancing regulatory capacity and moving forward on the agency’s enterprise and IT modernization.

What do you think? Do you agree with the Administration’s proposal, or do you think that there are additional programs where monies are needed on a priority basis? Send your comments to sgrossman@strengthenfda.org.