Incoming FDA Center for Tobacco Products director Mitch Zeller starts March 4. Zeller is currently senior VP at Pinney Associates, a science and public health policy consulting firm in Bethesda, Md. Prior to joining Pinney, Zeller was executive VP of the American Legacy Foundation, then associate commissioner and director of the FDA’s Office of Tobacco Programs, where he built the first nationwide program to reduce youth access to tobacco in the late 1990s before a Supreme Court decision shut down that office. He also served as a U.S. delegate to the World Health Organization Working Group for the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. Zeller began his public health career as assistant director for legal affairs at the Center for Science in the Public Interest. Following a nicotine replacement therapy public hearing in January, Zeller said FDA is at a crossroads and the U.S. has been lapped by other countries in allowing NRT indications like “reduce to quit” or “extended duration of use.” NRT issues fall under the purview of the agency’s drug center, not CTP ([A#05130114002]). Zeller replaces Lawrence Deyton, who is becoming a clinical professor of medicine and health policy at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences.
In Brief
Zeller heads FDA tobacco center; FDA denies P&G diabetes claim; Meda depends on OTCs; Ocean Nutrition boosts DSM; Elcelyx innovates in financing round; FDA warns DMAA firm on GMP violations; probiotics get Canadian claim approval.