[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Page 10081]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            VOTE EXPLANATION

  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I fully support the passage of S. 3187, 
the Food and Drug Administration, FDA, Safety and Innovation Act. This 
important piece of legislation reauthorizes and establishes important 
user fee agreements for drugs, devices, generic drugs and biosimilar 
biological products. Furthermore, the bill improves the medical device 
approval process and modernizes FDA's global drug supply chain 
authority to ensure that the drug manufacturing process is safer.
  The legislation also contains provisions to incentivize development 
of pediatric drugs and devices, spur innovation of new drug therapies 
for life-threatening medical conditions, mitigate drug shortages, and 
improve agency accountability and transparency in the drug and device 
approval process.
  Unfortunately, Mr. President, I was necessarily absent from the 
Senate and, therefore, unable to cast my vote in support of this bill.

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