During 2022, as COVID-19 illness became less deadly and less of a disruption in the lives of many Americans, the FDA to a substantial extent turned its attention to other matters, including regulatory issues that had necessarily been lower priorities while the agenda dealt with urgent public health needs during the first years of the pandemic.

The year 2022 brought important court decisions affecting the regulatory and enforcement realities facing the medical product and food industries, as well as significant initiatives from the government agencies that regulate them.

Developments during 2022 related to FDA and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) regulatory and enforcement activities are likely to reverberate throughout 2023. Below is our list of the 10 most important FDA and DEA developments of 2022 — and some predictions of what to expect during 2023.