The FDA’s former top drug regulator, Richard Pazdur, M.D., has lamented the loss of expert voices at the agency.

“Over the past year, there has really been an attack on the federal workforce,” Pazdur said at a Friday industry partnering event during the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) in San Diego.

He especially cited a massive, chaotic reduction in force (RIF) on April 1, 2025, the legality of which is under active scrutiny.



“People entered the FDA [building] and their badges didn’t work,” Pazdur recalled. “We didn't know who was RIFed, why they were RIFed, what was going to be the current structure after that.”

To this day, FDA leadership has not adequately addressed how the agency will respond to the massive turnover, he added. The layoffs also sparked a “palpable sense of anxiety” among remaining staffers, who worried they might be next.

Though he worries about the loss of senior and mid-career employees at the agency, Pazdur assured the crowd that he has confidence in his former staffers who remain. Pazdur decided to retire from the FDA last December, after serving less than a month in the role as director of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. A significant stint of his 26-year career at the agency was as founding director of the Oncology Center of Excellence...

...Though he worries about the FDA’s loss of expertise, that doesn’t mean Pazdur is eager to return to the agency. Asked by Fierce if he’s been requested to come back, or if he’d even consider returning, the veteran regulator shook his head no on both counts.

“Not under this administration,” Pazdur told Fierce. “For obvious reasons...”