[barrkel]

There's also the small matter of profiting from desperation with unproven remedies that do unknown, possibly permanent damage. There are good reasons and historical precedent for strong medicine safety regulations; it's not just bureaucracy.

[WalterBright]

This was covered in Sam Peltzman's "Regulation of Pharmaceutical Innovation" book, where he goes over the statistics before/after the 1962 FDA Amendments. Statistically, the percentage of drugs that later prove to be ineffective or damaging is no different, just the aggregate amount of new drugs, good and bad, is way less.

[lend000]

Preventing fraud is one thing. Holding fraudsters responsible is a thing. However, barring access outright to (properly labeled) experimental medicine is completely different, and that's what the FDA does (as well as enforce a bunch of monopolies).