Here’s a tutorial on the usual process for vaccine development, testing and approval, for folks tracking the new coronavirus (COVID-19). In brief: it will take a while and very large clinical trials to get a coronavirus vaccine approved at FDA. But preapproval testing is likely to happen on the ground where the coronavirus is spreading, and there is a potential for expanded access (to the unapproved vaccine) in the meantime.
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Case To Watch: Eagle v. Azar’s Hidden Chevron-Step-1 Issue
Recently I spoke at the annual meeting of the Food and Drug Law Institute (FDLI) on Eagle v. Azar, which is currently on appeal to the D.C. Circuit. At first blush the case seems of limited importance, because Eagle Pharmaceuticals is simply challenging FDA’s interpretation of statutory language that has since been amended. But reading through the litigation papers reveals a more interesting disagreement between the parties, about what a court should consider, when assessing whether a statute clearly answers a particular legal question. I will unpack this after the jump. Warning: this is more of an essay than a blog post. I start with a TL;DR.
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