We knew he’d land on his feet eventually

Dr. Scott Gottlieb, who until April was the head of the FDA, will soon join the board of directors of Pfizer, a company that makes drugs regulated by the FDA.

The news is guaranteed to raise the hackles of the many advocates who considered Gottlieb’s FDA as overly conciliatory to the industry it policed. Gottlieb’s pre-FDA career included time spent investing in and advising drug companies, a corporate original sin for which the Public Citizens of the world never forgave him.

But it’s worth noting that Gottlieb is far from the first FDA commissioner to find post-agency employment in the drug industry. Drs. Margaret Hamburg and Andrew von Eschenbach are on the respective boards of Alnynlam Pharmaceuticals and Bausch Health. And Gottlieb’s predecessor, Dr. Robert Califf, joined Google biotech spinoff Verily Life Sciences within four months of leaving the FDA.