FDA Official in Charge of Evaluating New Drugs Hospitalized for ‘Mental Disorder’

A high-level Food and Drug Administration scientist was involuntarily removed from his Maryland home by police May 9 for a mental disorder evaluation.

Doctor Jeffrey Siegel, director of the Food and Drug Administration’s Office of Drug Evaluation Sciences, was taken from his home by law enforcement Fire Rescue Services (FRS) to a hospital for a “mental disorder” around 3 a.m., according to the Montgomery County, Maryland, police dispatch log. He was released later the next day.

Montgomery County police did not immediately respond to an email requesting comment. Siegel posted an account of the incident on a neighborhood listserv, according to a report in Daily Wire. The police log indicates the incident began shortly after midnight and ended shortly after 3 a.m., but it is unclear what led someone to request an emergency petition.

“15 minutes later I saw bright red and blue lights outside the house and then EMTs in our house who started to ask me to please come with them,” Siegel wrote, more than a week after his hospitalization. “Thinking I was being asked to go voluntarily I politely declined. They insisted.”

The FDA scientist said FRS spun him around on the front hallway steps of his Moorland Lane home, handcuffed him and forced him onto a gurney for transport. Siegel said they then tied him down and stuffed him in the ambulance that transported him to a hospital.

Siegel included photos on his listserv post of bruised wrists, apparently sustained during a struggle with paramedics who were restraining him, and complained about “brain fog.” He railed against his concierge doctor for not providing pills to help him sleep.

“I’m an office director at FDA making major decisions every day that impact the public health,” explaining why his inability to sleep was a problem.

Neighbors questioned his account, saying someone had filed an “emergency petition” against him. Another commenter speculated that it was his wife, not the doctor, who called police on him.

“This glass of juice has leaks in it,” another commented. “I would suggest a psychologist, rather than a lawyer. Good luck getting the mental health help you need.”

This is an excerpt from Dailywire.