FDA Reporter Roundtable: A View From the News Desk – FDA Watch
Wayne chats with Lizzy Lawrence, Lead FDA Reporter at STAT; Derrick Gingery, Executive Editor for U.S. Regulatory and Policy Insights at The Pink Sheet; and Sarah Karlin-Smith, Research Director at Public Citizen’s Access to Medicines Program and former Reporter at The Pink Sheet. Together, they offer overarching themes surrounding FDA coverage today; how access to FDA decision-makers and frontline staff has changed recently; FDA’s tendency to announce policies via video announcements and press releases instead of through official guidances; how reporters decide what gets media attention; how the absence of advisory committees has created reporting challenges; stories reporters are eager to chase moving forward; and much more.
This episode and all bonus episodes do not include the usual Headlines and Resources Links segments.
About Our Guests
Lizzy Lawrence
Lizzy Lawrence leads STAT’s coverage of the Food and Drug Administration. She was previously a medical devices reporter. In 2024, she was part of a team that won the Polk award for an investigation into UnitedHealth. Earlier in her career, she wrote about Silicon Valley workplaces for tech news site Protocol.
Sarah Karlin-Smith
Sarah Karlin-Smith is the research director for Public Citizen’s Access to Medicines Program. Sarah spent 15 years as a journalist covering health policy and politics with a focus on drug development and pricing in the United States. Her work explores how government policies and pharma industry lobbying influence how medicines are developed and approved, what diseases are prioritized by scientists, and who gets access to treatment and at what cost.
Derrick Gingery
Derrick Gingery is executive editor for US regulatory and policy insights at the Pink Sheet, a trade publication that covers the FDA and prescription drug industry. He has been a journalist for more than 25 years and has won several awards. Derrick joined the Pink Sheet in 2010 and focuses on the US FDA user fee programs, regulations and policy for new and generic drugs, biologics and biosimilars, advisory committee and other agency activities, as well as federal legislation and budget matters on Capitol Hill. He also hosts Drug Fix, the Pink Sheet’s Pharma Regulatory Podcast.
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