This article utilizes a political economy framework to examine how FDA regulations impacted the U.S. healthcare sector's ability to address COVID‐19. I specifically examine the developing COVID‐19 testing, the approval of the medication remdesivir, and COVID‐19 vaccines. By examining periods before and after the FDA issued Emergency Use Authorizations (EUAs), my analysis finds that the FDA's regulations enacted before the COVID‐19 pandemic began strongly restricted clinician and patient access to COVID‐19 testing, remdesivir treatment, and approving vaccines. After the FDA issued EUAs, the healthcare sector quickly adopted COVID‐19 testing and remdesivir with little evidence of negative consequences. These findings contribute to the economics literature examining the FDA and contemporary COVID‐19 policy research.

中文翻译：

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FDA 和 COVID-19：政治经济学视角

本文利用政治经济学框架来研究 FDA 法规如何影响美国医疗保健部门应对 COVID-19 的能力。我专门研究了开发中的 COVID-19 测试、药物瑞德西韦的批准和 COVID-19 疫苗。通过检查 FDA 发布紧急使用授权 (EUA) 前后的时间段，我的分析发现，在 COVID-19 大流行开始之前颁布的 FDA 法规严重限制了临床医生和患者获得 COVID-19 检测、瑞德西韦治疗和批准疫苗的机会。在 FDA 发布 EUA 后，医疗保健部门迅速采用了 COVID-19 检测和瑞德西韦，几乎没有负面后果的证据。这些发现有助于研究 FDA 和当代 COVID-19 政策研究的经济学文献。