A Fox News medical contributor lambasted the Food and Drug Administration for their response to the ongoing national drug shortage Wednesday, arguing the agency is “sitting limply by” and not working to solve the issue.
“Don’t think the FDA is actually doing anything about this, they’re sitting limply by. The story begins and ends in China tonight because those lockdowns, those ridiculous lockdowns, COVID-zero policies, cut off the supply chains,” NYU Langone Medical Center clinical professor and doctor Marc Siegel told Tucker Carlson. “And we get, according to the U.S. Census, we get 95% of our imported ibuprofen from China and 74% of our Tylenol and almost all of our antibiotics. So now, what has happened? They relieve the lockdowns and in China, people are scrambling to the pharmacies trying to find Tylenol, trying to find Motrin. We’re not going to get it because they’re hoarding it over there.”
Siegel claimed that the issue is caused at least in part by a global “pharmaceutical culture” that encourages people to actively seek unneeded medications under the false assumption that it could help them care for a loved one.
Drug shortages are apparently getting so dire internationally that some Canadians have reportedly come to the United States in hopes of finding Tylenol and ibuprofen due to shortages in their own country.
Doctors are now often unable to find medications that are frequently used to treat common ailments such as asthma or the flu and have consequently sought out alternatives, Fox Business reported Friday.
“I know what you think about pharmaceuticals and I agree with you, Tucker,” Siegel said. “We’re a pill-popping culture, and so here’s what happens. A parent goes to the pharmacy, they can’t get a Tylenol. Kid has a fever, they rush him to the emergency room unnecessarily, and that’s what you’ve been talking about for a long time now.”
“But look where this is coming from. Supply chain problems from China; China, the same country, Tucker, that exports the influenza virus that we see every year,” he continued. “Exported Covid to us. Now, we can’t go to them for the pills we need to treat the common cold or the antibiotics we need. The problem starts and begins with China, Tucker.”
"From our viewpoint, every life has equal value … but when a life should end is not something that should be left up to human beings," Rabbi Berel Bell, who lives and works in Montreal, told Fox News Digital. "Our creator knows how and when to end lives.” https://t.co/wNii72kBxY
— Marc Siegel MD (@DrMarcSiegel) November 23, 2022
