The FDA drilled into patients’ skulls for a placebo. Heidi Overton can end that era 37%
By Benjamin Johnson0%
7/11/2026, 12:00:00 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 2 faulty reasoning types, including Appeal to Emotion, with Politically Right Leaning Bias as the most egregious example at 8.1% saturation with 69 hits. Analysis detected 78 faulty-reasoning hits from 851 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 44.8% and a BS Rank of 37% (8,936 of 14,149 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 63.20% of the article peer group.
“Human life is not disposable, but a precious gift from God , with inherent worth and dignity.”
It’s encouraging to learn that the author of those words, Dr.
Heidi Overton, is reportedly one of three candidates under consideration to become the next commissioner of the U.S.
Food and Drug Administration .
The FDA’s recent turmoil was driven in part by outrage over its handling of rare disease treatments.
Whoever inherits that agency, 30 million people living with rare diseases (half of them children) deserve to know whether they should expect meaningful reform .
Overton built an impressive resume at a remarkably young age.
Her experience spans medicine, public health, the White House policy shop, and think tank experience as a healthcare policy leader at America First Policy Institute.
She managed the U.S. response to the Ebola crisis in Africa this spring, and HHS Secretary Robert F.
Kennedy Jr. thanked both former FDA Commissioner Dr.
Marty Makary and Overton for their roles in negotiating lower drug prices last fall.
Overton now appears poised to become the youngest FDA commissioner in U.S. history .
If confirmed, she would replace Makary, whose tenure Sen.
Josh Hawley (R-MO) described as “uniquely destructive to the pro-life movement.”
By contrast, Overton has rightly pointed out the Democratic Party’s abortion extremism and advanced an anti-abortion policy agenda.
She has close ties to her predecessor: Makary began mentoring her 10 years ago, when she was a general surgery resident at Johns Hopkins University.
The two collaborated on a number of peer-reviewed studies, sometimes funded by Arnold Ventures, a left-leaning organization whose structure evades financial transparency and which exercised influence in Makary’s FDA.
He clearly saw great potential in the young physician .
The question is whether she will carry on his legacy of setting up roadblocks to treatments for people suffering from rare diseases.
If Overton breaks with Makary’s record on approval decisions, she could bring a clean slate to an issue begging for a clear-eyed vision.
Overton would have an extraordinary opportunity to restore trust between the FDA and those living with rare diseases.
But as Overton worked closely with Makary in the past, patients must question whether a change in commissioner will amount to a change in direction.
These patients hope the next commissioner’s term is not filled with the disappointments of the past, but with gold-standard science, moral courage, and a steadfast commitment to putting patients first.
The average person with a rare disease loses almost five years obtaining an accurate diagnosis.
One in 4 waits more than seven.
Yet they have often encountered more discouragement from FDA leadership, which denied them the right to avail themselves of new treatments .
Former Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research Chief Dr.
Vinay Prasad paused access to Elevidys, a genetic treatment for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, then released it on a limited basis.
He also rejected or took adverse actions against treatments for Hunter syndrome, advanced melanoma, Barth syndrome, Hereditary Angioedema, and Sanfilippo syndrome.
In perhaps the worst example, Prasad ordered uniQure’s gene therapy treatment for Huntington’s Disease, AMT-130, to be tested in a study that would involve drilling through patients’ skulls and injecting the control group’s brains with a placebo.
This record, in part, led President Donald Trump to order Prasad’s termination.
The environment began to shift after acting FDA Chief Kyle Diamantas met with rare disease representatives in June.
He immediately reopened uniQure’s application.
Though the FDA rejected the use of RP1 to treat melanoma during Prasad’s last days on the job, the agency now plans to reconsider approval by Aug.
2.
If confirmed, Overton has an opportunity to embrace accelerated approval in limited circumstances and ensure rare disease patients have a permanent seat at the table.
She can staff advisory commissions with ethicists and experts uniquely knowledgeable about the impact of rare disease treatments.
That approach is more compatible with Trump’s Right to Try Act and the MAHA movement’s emphasis on informed consent than Prasad’s denials.
It’s clearly an ethical best practice for the government to offer suffering people the right to choose experimental treatment when the alternative is 100% likelihood of early death.
These therapies can provide immediate relief while the FDA emphasizes preventive medicine for long-term national health and wellness.
Overton is right; her mentor was wrong.
Life is a precious, divine gift with its own infinite value.
The gift of life comes to us minute by minute, each second bearing inherent worth — however painful, labored, or disparaged it may be.
WE SAVED OUR DAUGHTER OVERSEAS.
CONGRESS CAN HELP THE NEXT FAMILY DO IT HERE
No one should deny patients the right to claw back a few moments disease steals from them or to live their lives to the fullest on their own terms.
The rare disease community deserves a commissioner finally willing to chart that course.
Anything less would be more of the same.
Benjamin Johnson is an Eastern Orthodox priest and conservative editor, journalist, and commentator.
Follow him at @therightswriter .
His views are his own.
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0%flagged-word coverageHeidi Overton
17 attributed words61% of attributed speech9.5% writer coverage
Politically Right Leaning Bias-8.4 pts
Writer 8.4%Heidi Overton 0%
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