Populist peril

Some things change, some remain the same. Following last week's mid-term elections in the U.S., the biggest challenge to new drug development in Washington remains the same as it was under Republican leadership: regulatory reform.

What has changed is the likelihood that things won't go well. Indeed, after a nine-year run of efforts to stimulate regulatory innovations that support therapeutic innovation, the tide looks to be moving even more toward the agenda of regulatory reformers whose nostrums to protect the public arguably would delay or prevent new treatments from reaching the bedside...