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The Food And Drug Administration Is A Regulatory Agency Responsible For The Public Health Of American Residents Essay

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The Food and Drug Administration is a regulatory agency responsible for the public health of American residents. The agency is located in Silver Springs, Maryland. The current extent of FDA regulations reaches a wide variety of product groups such as electronic devices, cosmetics, foods, biologics, tobacco, medical devices, and veterinary devices (US Food & Drug Administration, 2016). The FDA is also accountable for the safety of the food supply, prescription drugs, and the manufacturing of products such as tobacco (US Food & Drug Administration, 2016). The FDA’s organization is divided into five offices: office of the commissioner, foods and veterinary medicine, medical products and tobacco, global regulatory operations and policy, and operations (FDA Organization, 2016). According to the FDA website, the President’s 2016 fiscal year FDA budget is 4.9 billion dollars (2016 FDA Budget Summary, 2016).
The FDA’s origin did not begin as the federal consumer protection agency it is widely recognized for being today. Prior to the FDA transforming into the present-day agency, the FDA’s emergence can be traced back to the agricultural industry during the 1800’s (History, 2015). In fact, it was Congress that enacted the FDCA (Food, Drugs, & Cosmetics Act) of 1938 that created the modern-day FDA (Allen, 2013). Despite the FDA’s passing of the tobacco law, the ongoing issues concerning the under and over regulation of products, and the high number of drug recalls suggests that the

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