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www.desitalk.com – that’s all you need to know 10 NATIONAL AFFAIRS March 13, 2026 T he nation’s controversial top vac- cine regulator is leaving his job at the end of April, federal health officials said Friday. Vinay Prasad had begun his role leading vaccines and complex treatments for difficult diseases in May, but has had a rocky tenure at the Food and Drug Ad- ministration over the past year, overseeing divisive decisions about drugs and a new plan to tighten vaccine approvals. “He got a tremendous amount accom- plished within his one-year sabbatical from [University of California at San Fran- cisco] and will be returning back to his academic home later next month,” FDA Commissioner Marty Makary wrote in a post on X. He cited some of Prasad’s work, including on new guidelines narrowing approvals of new coronavirus vaccines to older adults and those with health condi- tions and new vouchers to expedite drug decisions. TheWall Street Journal first reported the news. Prasad did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Prasad, a key Makary ally, had been ousted at the direction of theWhite House in July after a right-wing pressure cam- paign over his handling of drug approvals and past support for Democrats. He was hired back less than two weeks later after Makary, who championed and elevated Prasad, reached out to theWhite House. TheWhite House then reevaluated criti- cisms of Prasad and supported his return after finding them disingenuous. In late November, Prasad laid out a stricter approach for federal vaccine approvals, citing his team’s conclusion, without detailing the evidence, that coronavirus vaccines had contributed to the deaths of at least 10 children. Former leaders of the FDA had condemned the plans, saying they risked undermining the nation’s ability to fight infectious diseases. “I remain open to vigorous discussions and debate,” Prasad wrote to his team in an internal email laying out his propos- als. He added that staff who did not agree with these core principles, including keeping policy debates private among FDA staff, should submit their resigna- tions. Prasad had recently faced backlash for declining to review a Moderna applica- tion for the first mRNA-based flu vaccine, a decision that shocked the company. The FDA reversed course the next week and agreed to review the company’s applica- tion under a revised approach. He had also come under fire for decisions his center has recently made related to drugs for rare diseases, notably disagreements about the study design of an experimental treatment to slow the progression of Huntington’s disease made by gene therapy company uniQure. Before joining the federal government, Prasad – a hematologist and oncologist – rose to prominence as a vocal critic of pandemic-era policies and had long criti- cized the regulatory process for approving cancer drugs. In an internal email to FDA staff ob- tained by TheWashington Post, Makary wrote that a search for the new head of the agency’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research is underway. Prasad had replaced Peter Marks, the architect of the U.S. program to rapidly develop coronavi- rus vaccines who the Trump administra- tion forced out last spring. Makary had defended Prasad as re- cently as late last month on CNBC, calling him a “genius” who has been on “loan from UCSF.” The changes come amid a broader personnel shake-up at the Department of Health and Human Services with the aim of stabilizing a department that had been shaken by infighting and controversial messages. The drug industry and public health experts had been rattled last last year by leadership turnover at the FDA, with concerns over the agency’s direction mounting. The Trump administration has also been seeking to downplay its contro- versial push to overhaul vaccine policy and instead tout work on food and drug pricing ahead of the midterm elections. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the founder of a prominent anti-vaccine group, oversaw a major reduction to the childhood vaccine schedule earlier this year, but has since focused on more broadly popular aspects of his Make America Healthy Again agenda. -TheWashington Post Controversial Top Vaccine Regulator Vinay Prasad To Depart FDA By Rachel Roubein Former CFO Nevin Shetty, Sentenced To Two Years In Prison For $35 Million Theft From Start-Up Tech Firm A Mercer Island, Washington, man was sentenced March 5, 2026, in U.S. District Court in Seattle to two years in prison for four counts of wire fraud for taking and misusing some $35 million from his former employer. Tthe conviction was announced by First Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles Neil Floyd. Nevin Shetty, 42, was found guilty on November 7, 2025, following a nine-day jury trial. At the sentencing hearing Judge Tana Lin told Shetty, “The loss had sig- nificant and severe effects on the company. Your actions threw into complete turmoil the lives of those 60 people (who were laid off) …. You almost put the company out of business…. You were playing with money that wasn’t yours.” According to records in the case, Shetty was hired as the CFO of a private software company in March 2021. The company was raising capital for its work in multiple rounds of funding. The company, with Shetty, drafted a policy governing how the money raised should be kept safe while the company worked to grow its business. The company adopted an investment policy statement that called for company cash to be invested only in money market accounts or other conservative investments. The company’s overriding objective was to preserve its capital for use in operating and growing the business, the press release from the US Attorney said. Even though Shetty helped draft the policy and dis- seminate it to the board of directors for approval, he secretly moved approximately $35 million in company funds to a cryptocurrency platform he controlled as a side business. Shetty created that side business, called HighTower Treasury, in early 2022. It had no other outside custom- ers. In April 2022, shortly after he was told he could not continue as CFO at his employer due to concerns about his performance, Shetty secretly transferred the funds out of his employer’s account. Between April 1 and 12, 2022, using wire transfers he ordered from a Chase bank branch near his home, Shetty moved $35,000,100 of his employer’s money to an account for HighTower Treasury. No other executives or board members at the company knew of these transfers. Shetty, through HighTower, then placed the money in a realm of cryptocurrency sometimes referred to as decentralized finance or “DeFi.” Shetty chose high-yield DeFi lending protocols that promised to generate returns of 20% or more. According to prosecutors, Shetty’s idea was that HighT- ower would pay Shetty’s company a comparatively small, fixed amount and keep the remainder of the returns for itself. As an owner of HighTower, Shetty stood to person- ally share in those profits, which could have been sub- stantial. In the first month alone, Shetty’s scheme earned roughly $133,000 of profit for himself and his HighTower business partner. However, the cryptocurrency investments that Shetty made with the stolen funds soon began declining and by May 13, 2022, the value of the investments was nearly zero. After the $35 million was essentially gone, Shetty told two of his fellow executives what he had done. He was immediately fired. Assistant U.S. Attorney Philip Kopczynski asked for a nine-year prison sentence on grounds that Shetty’s “serious crime deserves stern punishment,” and that 60 people’s lives and careers were “irrevocably damaged by Shetty’s greed.” Shetty was ordered to pay $35,000,100 and will be on supervised release for three years after prison. Judge Lin imposed a special condition that he not serve as an of- ficer or director of a company without prior permission from the probation office. By a StaffWriter PHOTO:FDA.GOV Vinay Prasad, FDA’s Director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. Stock photo. PHOTO:DREAMSTIME