Katie Drummond: Normal. Move quickly and break things when we talked a lot in Wired over the past few months. We will take a tiny break when we come back, what you have to read today on Wired.
Welcome back in Uncanny Valley. I am Katie Drummond, Global Editorial Director Wired. I am joined by the Wired business and industry director, Zoë Schiffer. Now Zoë, before I let you leave, tell our listeners what they absolutely have to read, they have to read today at Wired.com, except for the stories we talked about in this episode.
Zoë Schiffer: Ok I would like to have a nice, cheerful, uplifting story that I can talk to you about, but I have another history of extermination and darkness, and this is through …
Katie Drummond: Aw-shucks.
Zoë Schiffer: I know. This is Caroline Haskins, who is a freelancer for us, and we have just announced that he joins the business desk. So invigorating. She is amazing. It’s so good. I am very excited. And she wrote an article that we published yesterday about how Trump and Elon Musk’s cuts in the FDA, so another administration that has experienced stern budget cuts and staff is already exposed to drug development. And she got it from dozens of SEC applications from pharmaceutical companies.
Katie Drummond: So, between this SEC application and what you and Emily informed about these freezing credit cards yesterday, it certainly seems that federal agencies are stopping here in really consistent ways.
Zoë Schiffer: Yes. That is, this is intriguing because pharmaceutical companies, pharmaceutical companies do not even say: “FDA does not approve our drugs, so these drugs cannot come to the market.” They say that this agency was already so slowly moving according to design, because the rates are very, very high when you talk about drugs and medicines. And so employee cuts, budget cuts. He is worried that it will stop. And if you are a pharmaceutical company that decides to continue the production of a drug that has already been approved, or sacrificing a lot of time, energy and resources, money for the development of a recent medicine that you are not sure will receive the approval of the FDA, you will suddenly see less of this and more of this and more, ok, we will simply throw money on the existing product pipeline. And this has really stern consequences for people who may need these recent therapies.
Katie Drummond: Zoë, thank you for all the joy you brought today to our program. Thank you for joining me. However, really fascinating things and so grateful for reporting and reporting of the team.
Zoë Schiffer: Thank you very much for having me.
Katie Drummond: This is our program for today. We will connect with all the stories that we talked about today in notes. Remember to check the Thursday episode Uncanny Valleywhich concerns the movement of the pro-natalist Silicon Valley. If you like what you heard today, follow our program and rate it in the selected podcast application. If you want to contact which of us to get questions, comments or suggestions, write to us at uncannyvalley@wired.com.
Amar Lal from Macro Sound mixed in this episode. Jake Lummus is our studio engineer. Jordan Bell is our executive producer, the head of Global Audio Condé is Chris Bannon. And I’m Katie Drummond, Global Editorial Director Wired.
Goodbye.