> In any case, the only hurdle to selling should be "does it do harm?", and "does it work as advertised?" can be determined later, if and only if there is any doubt among the consumers.
Laws don't operate under the principle of what should be, they are past agreements hammered out by negotiation, not logic. You don't get to say what the hurdle "should" be, that's already been agreed upon and set and it's unlikely to change because a few don't like it.
> Elsewhere in consumerland, the product is sold, and independent testing is performed on off-the-shelf samples. If a problem is found, a recall may occur.
Sometimes, sometimes not, it entirely depends on the law in those areas. Recalls don't help people who are dying from bad medication, the FDA's role is preventative, not reactionary.
> If the FDA did not apply prior restraint
That's their job, it's why they exist.
> and tested products already available to the consumer,
Then they'd be useless.
> it could regulate the usage of the phrase "FDA-approved" and make perfectly safe everyone who buys only the medicines bearing that approval for the purposes which have been tested.
Sorry, but their job is to protect people who don't have the information/brains to protect themselves, which in the field of medicine is practically everyone. This solution is simply a libertarian fantasy that has no chance of working in the real world. As the other poster said, see homoeopathy as an example, consumers aren't smart enough to not kill themselves with idiocy, even the rich ones like Steve Jobs.
Laws don't operate under the principle of what should be, they are past agreements hammered out by negotiation, not logic. You don't get to say what the hurdle "should" be, that's already been agreed upon and set and it's unlikely to change because a few don't like it.
> Elsewhere in consumerland, the product is sold, and independent testing is performed on off-the-shelf samples. If a problem is found, a recall may occur.
Sometimes, sometimes not, it entirely depends on the law in those areas. Recalls don't help people who are dying from bad medication, the FDA's role is preventative, not reactionary.
> If the FDA did not apply prior restraint
That's their job, it's why they exist.
> and tested products already available to the consumer,
Then they'd be useless.
> it could regulate the usage of the phrase "FDA-approved" and make perfectly safe everyone who buys only the medicines bearing that approval for the purposes which have been tested.
Sorry, but their job is to protect people who don't have the information/brains to protect themselves, which in the field of medicine is practically everyone. This solution is simply a libertarian fantasy that has no chance of working in the real world. As the other poster said, see homoeopathy as an example, consumers aren't smart enough to not kill themselves with idiocy, even the rich ones like Steve Jobs.