FDA to Recruit 1,300 Science and Medical Positions

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has embarked on a multiyear initiative to hire hundreds of individuals with science and medical backgrounds to help meet the agency’s responsibilities to ensure the safety and efficacy of human and veterinary drugs, biological products, medical devices, food, and cosmetics.

In 2008 alone, the agency is looking to fill more than 600 new positions and to backfill over 700 others to implement the FDA Amendments Act of 2007, the Food Protection Plan, and the Import Safety Action Plan. That’s nearly triple the number of people hired from 2005–2007.

The critical need occupations are medical officers, consumer safety officers, chemists, nurse consultants, biologists, microbiologists, health/regulatory/general health scientists, mathematical statisticians, epidemiologists, pharmacologists, pharmacists, and veterinary medical officers.