FDA Announces New Appointments in Office of the Commissioner

October 16, 2009

The Food and Drug Administration today announced the appointment of several new senior staff members at the agency. These individuals comprise a wide range of training and experience in science, medicine, law and health policy, both within government and in the private sector. Some will fill existing vacant positions, others will occupy newly created ones.

The new appointments being announced today are:

R. Alta Charo began service recently within the agency’s Office of Policy as a senior advisor on a range of issues raised by emerging technologies, such as genetics, biotechnology, nanotechnology, and synthetic biology. Ms. Charo was a member of the NIH Human Embryo Research Panel and President Clinton’s National Bioethics Advisory Commissioner. Since 1989, she has been a professor of law and bioethics at the law and medical schools of the University of Wisconsin – Madison.

Jeffrey A. Farrar, DVM, MPH, PhD will act as Associate Commissioner for Food Protection. Dr. Farrar, a nationally recognized food safety expert, has most recently served as director of the California Department of Public Health’s Food and Drug Branch, where he oversaw the inspection and regulation of thousands of food, drug, and device manufacturers within that state.

Jeanne C. Ireland is FDA’s new Assistant Commissioner for Legislation. Ms. Ireland has most recently been Chief Public Health Advisor to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, U.S. House of Representatives, where she was deeply involved in developing legislation on a range of FDA-related and other health issues. Prior to her service with the Congress, she was Director of Public Policy for the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, and prior to that Minority Staff Director, Subcommittee on Children and Families, Senate HELP Committee.

Jessica Leighton, PhD. will serve as a senior advisor on nutrition and food safety, reporting to the Deputy Commissioner for Foods. She comes to FDA from the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, where she was the Deputy Commissioner of Environmental Health, overseeing a division of 8 bureaus and a staff of 1,000, where she was responsible for food safety, community sanitation, environmental emergency preparedness and many other public health programs.

Peter G. Lurie, MD, MPH, will serve in the agency’s Office of Policy, where he will help develop strategies to facilitate medical product availability to meet critical public health needs, reporting to the Assistant Commissioner for Policy. Dr. Lurie has most recently been Deputy Director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group in Washington, DC and is an adjunct faculty member at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the George Washington University School of Public Health and Life Sciences.

Meghan Scott is FDA’s new Chief Press Officer, who will be responsible for the daily press operations in the Office of Public Affairs. Previously, she was campaign director of Wake Up Walmart, a project of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union; and before that Communications Director for the American Association of Justice. Ms. Scott began her career as a reporter for the daily newspaper in Easton, Pa and interned in CNN’s Washington bureau.

Vicki L. Seyfert-Margolis, PhD will also be advising FDA’s Chief Scientist in his mission of upgrading science, with a focus on bioinformatics. She has most recently been Chief Scientific Officer at Immune Tolerance Network, a non-profit consortium of researchers seeking new treatments for diseases of the immune system; and an Adjunct Associate Professor with the Department of Medicine at the University of California San Francisco. Prior to that, Dr. Seyfert was a program director in innovative scientific research at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health.

John M. Taylor, III will occupy a new position at FDA, Counselor to the Commissioner, where he will oversee the agency’s crisis response functions as well as advise on a range of policy and regulatory matters. An attorney, Mr. Taylor served previously with FDA as a staff lawyer, an advisor to previous Commissioners, and as Associate Commissioner for Regulatory Affairs. He most recently has been Executive Vice President, Health, at the Biotechnology Industry Organization, after serving as a Divisional Vice President for Federal Governmental Affairs at Abbott Laboratories.

Ann C. Witt also has prior service with FDA, as a staff attorney and advisor to previous Commissioners. She will be returning to her previous position as Counselor to the Deputy Commissioner for Policy, after having served for the past six years as counsel to Representative Henry Waxman of California and the House of Representatives’ Committee on Energy and Commerce.