The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has a new point person for healthcare competition issues, Emma Mittelstaedt Burnham, stepping up as the Associate Director for Healthcare in the Bureau of Competition, with FTC Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson announcing the appointment just yesterday. In remarks preserved on the FTC website, Ferguson expressed his confidence in Burnham's abilities, stating, "She is a talented attorney with many years of experience at the Department of Justice as a senior antitrust enforcer," and underscored her role in continuing the FTC’s mission to preserve Americans' access to healthcare that's both affordable and high-quality.
Burnham is no stranger to antitrust battles, having built an 11-year career with the DOJ, where she was thick in the trenches fighting against price-fixing schemes and leading investigations that sometimes spiraled into the largest corporate prosecutions the generic pharmaceutical industry had ever seen—with record-breaking criminal penalties to match. Her work before joining the Antitrust Division included criminal defense stints in DC and LA law firms, and she founded her legal acumen at the University of Chicago Law School, followed by a clerkship under the tutelage of Judge Robert W. Gettleman in Illinois, per the FTC's press release.
Embedded within the FTC's announcement is a reminder of its core mission—promoting competition and safeguarding consumers from the plethora of scams and deceptive practices that bleed into commerce; the FTC stands as a bulwark against such corrosion, never shaking down consumers for money, making threats, or luring them with dubious promises of prizes. For those looking to stay savvy about consumer rights or to take action against scams, the FTC’s reporting site is always on standby at ReportFraud.ftc.gov, and staying connected via social media or subscribing to their releases is as simple as a few clicks.
