The tragic deaths of 55 Americans and sickening of more than 740, resulting from contaminated steroid injections that were shipped by a disreputable firm in Massachusetts, have rightly focused public attention on a largely unfamiliar, but prominent part of our drug supply chain – the practice of pharmacy compounding.

Scott Gottlieb's testimony for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Subcommittee on Health's hearing on drug compounding.

Click here to watch Resident Fellow Scott Gottlieb debate the hazards of the FDA on Intelligence Squared U.S. Debates.

Drug companies -- at least every one that I've worked with -- would like to develop important new medicines that improve health and save lives. That's what gets every industry researcher I know up in the morning, and what keeps them going through the many highs and lows that characterize the scientific process.

Given the tremendous headwinds facing the biopharmaceutical industry today, it is questionable whether traditional, management will continue to prove an effective strategy, or whether they ultimately will be run over by smaller companies willing to bet on a larger vision, leanly executed. 

If I had to distill the opportunities of digital health in medicine down to two themes, I'd nominate "Measurement" and "Participation."

In Asia, more than 120 people have been sickened, and 23 are dead, from a potent strain of bird flu that has the frightening markings of a potential pandemic strain. There’s a greater risk that this strain could acquire the ability to spread more easily from person to person. If it does, it could have devastating consequences.

Speculation is widespread about the potential origins of the Boston and U.S. Capitol attacks, and whether they could be related (seems unlikely). Investigations are underway. In time, we also must ask how much safer we’ve made ourselves based on the lessons we learned after 9-11. And whether there are still precautions we should heed.

Digital health has waited – for a very long time — to be taken seriously by investors; I suspect the moment has finally arrived.

Discovering impactful new drugs is far more difficult - and far less linear - than is typically recognized.