The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has tapped Vinay Prasad, a prominent critic of federal COVID-19 policies and a proponent of more stringent approval standards, to lead the agency’s vaccines division.
Prasad replaces Peter Marks, the longtime leader of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER), who resigned in March after clashing with Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
“Dr. Prasad brings the kind of scientific rigor, independence, and transparency we need at CBER — a significant step forward,” FDA Commissioner Martin Makary posted on the social platform X on Tuesday.
Prasad was previously an epidemiology professor at the University of California, San Francisco. He graduated medical school at the University of Chicago and has a master’s degree in public health from Johns Hopkins University. He is an oncologist and hematologist by training.
Prasad is the latest of a series of medical contrarians and critics of COVID-19 measures to join Kennedy’s HHS.
Prasad gained national prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic through his social media posts that were highly critical of mask and vaccine mandates, as well as decisions by federal regulators to speed up the availability of vaccine boosters from Pfizer and Moderna.
He collaborated with Makary on a paper attacking the recommendation for booster shots in teens and young adults. Tracy Beth Høeg, a sports medicine physician who is now special assistant to Makary, was also one of the authors.
Prasad said last year that Marks was “either incompetent or corrupt to authorize a booster without clinical, randomized data.”
Prasad is also highly critical of the pharmaceutical industry and has pushed for much stricter evidence-based standards for new drug approvals.
In a Substack post after Marks was ousted in March, Prasad called him “one of the most dangerous, pro-pharma regulators of the 21st century,” and he said Marks helped former President Biden perpetuate “the single greatest anti-vax action in the 21st century” by fast-tracking full approval of the COVID vaccine so it could be mandated.
Prasad’s appointment comes at a time when the FDA is floating changes that critics say could delay approvals of new COVID vaccines by mandating clinical trials — something that Prasad said he supports.
