Non-Objective Law vs. Medical Innovation

Writing for the Foundation for Economic Education, Gavin Wax argues, per his title, that "The COVID-19 Crisis Is the Result of Decades of FDA Misrule."

Contrary to popular misconceptions, I advocate deregulation because I support freedom and science, not lawlessness or quack remedies. (Image based on FDA logo, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain under U.S. law. Feel free to re-use this image. I would appreciate attribution, but do not require it.)

I have long advocated the abolishment of the FDA and have sometimes noted that agency's malfeasance here. So, lots of this may be old news to readers here. On top of that, I oppose all talk of "reforming" an organization whose very foundational idea is corrupt -- and refuse to use a term like "over-regulation." This article does both, like many conservative treatments of the topic of regulation.

Having said all that, I can almost hear you ask why I am pointing to this article.

The below was news to me, and reveals the threat to our health from the FDA is much more serious than I realized. Wax notes that, in the 1990's, the FDA started using "tactics familiar in communist countries" to enforce its edicts. He quotes one of its functionaries at the time:

The old way is over. We used to say that if a company made certain changes, then we would probably not take any action. Now, we won't. Now, even if they make the changes, they might end up in court. We want to say to these companies that you don't know when or how we'll strike. We want to eliminate predictability. [bold added]

In other words, the FDA isn't simply burdening medicine with hoops and red tape, which would be bad enough; it's subjecting that vital industry to what Ayn Rand called non-objective law.

When men are caught in the trap of non-objective law, when their work, future and livelihood are at the mercy of a bureaucrat's whim, when they have no way of knowing what unknown "influence" will crack down on them for which unspecified offense, fear becomes their basic motive, if they remain in the industry at all -- and compromise, conformity, staleness, dullness, the dismal grayness of the middle-of-the-road are all that can be expected of them. Independent thinking does not submit to bureaucratic edicts, originality does not follow "public policies," integrity does not petition for a license, heroism is not fostered by fear, creative genius is not summoned forth at the point of a gun.

Non-objective law is the most effective weapon of human enslavement: its victims become its enforcers and enslave themselves. ("Vast Quicksands," The Objectivist Newsletter, July 1963, p. 25)

Wax expresses concern that the public might not accept the idea of ridding itself of the FDA. I was, to the contrary, already becoming less pessimistic about this prospect as the crisis has revealed the culpability and nature of this agency. Its abusive treatment of innovators and entrepreneurs should seal the deal in terms of painting a moral case for freedom in medicine, as well as showing the urgency of acting accordingly.

-- CAV