Martin
A
Makary
M.D., M.P.H.
Leadership Role
Commissioner of Food and Drugs - Food and Drug Administration
Dr. Marty Makary was confirmed on March 25, 2025 by a bipartisan vote of the U.S. Senate as the 27th Commissioner of Food and Drugs.
In this role, Dr. Makary oversees the full breadth of the FDA portfolio and execution of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act and other applicable laws. This includes assuring the safety, effectiveness, and security of human and veterinary drugs, vaccines and other biological products for human use, and medical devices; the safety and security of our nation's food supply, cosmetics, dietary supplements, products that give off electronic radiation; and the regulation of tobacco products.
Prior to joining the FDA, Dr. Makary worked at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, where he was a surgical oncologist specializing in hepatobiliary and pancreatic surgery and was the chief of Islet Transplant Surgery. After six years on the faculty at JHU, Dr. Makary was named an endowed chair in gastrointestinal surgery, and subsequently promoted to full professor with tenure. He has served as a professor, by courtesy, at the Johns Hopkins Carey Business School. His academic work also involved a broad range of public policy research including on the underlying causes of disease, health care costs, and relationship-based medicine.
Dr. Makary is a widely published writer, having authored more than 300 peer-reviewed articles in medical journals as well as being a regular contributor to journalistic publications including The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. He is the author of three New York Times bestselling books on health care, including: “Unaccountable – What Hospitals Tell You and How Transparency Can Revolutionize Health Care;” “The Price We Pay,” which examines issues contributing to the increasing costs of health care; and which was named 2020 Business Book of the Year by the Association of Business Journalists; and “Blind Spots -- When Medicine Gets It Wrong, and What It Means for Our Health,” which presents the latest scientific research on the microbiome, food and other health topics.
Dr. Makary has led cross-disciplinary research on a range of subjects including cancer care, obesity, frailty and psychologic reserve in older patients, adverse event monitoring, the Orphan Drug Act, antimicrobial resistance, and Alzheimer’s. Of particular note, he is the co-developer of the Surgery Checklist used in many operating rooms around the world today. He also founded the Johns Hopkins Center for Surgical Trials and Outcomes Research.
Dr. Makary was the first to perform several novel surgical operations, including the first-in-the-world series of laparoscopic pancreas islet transplant operations. For his pioneering work, Dr. Makary was awarded the Nobility in Science Award from the National Pancreas Foundation. For the last 22 years, he has had an active clinical practice.
Dr. Makary co-authored postoperative opioid prescribing guidelines that were adopted broadly at the start of the opioid crisis response. During the COVID pandemic, he and his Johns Hopkins colleagues conducted landmark antibody studies on natural immunity published in JAMA. Most recently, his research has focused on vulnerable populations in health care.
Dr. Makary has led national quality collaboratives, served on several editorial boards, and was the first editor-in-chief of MedPage Today. He has served in a leadership position at the World Health Organization Patient Safety Program, and in 2018 was elected to the National Academy of Medicine.
Dr. Makary graduated from Bucknell University and earned an M.P.H. from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He received his M.D. from Thomas Jefferson University and did his surgical residency at Georgetown University, completing sub-specialty surgery training at Johns Hopkins University.