The FDA's safety notices start in 2020
The FDA's live list of drug safety notices begins in 2020. For anything older the page offers one link, and it points at the Internet Archive.
We have not finished checking this source. No judgement either way. how we score evidence
Caveat on this rating: The register here is disclosure, not accusation, and the row is written to keep it that way. Retiring old pages is ordinary site maintenance, the FDA states the pre-2020 position itself rather than concealing it, and no claim of deletion or suppression is made anywhere on this row. What is stated is the effect: part of the public record of American drug regulation is reachable only through a nonprofit archive. The reader draws the inference. Note also that the older fda.gov path for this index (.../drug-safety-and-availability-drug-safety-communications) now 404s in its own right; the live address is the shorter one this row cites.
The FDA's list of drug safety notices begins in 2020. Everything older is one link, and it points at a nonprofit's archive.
Significant findings
A Drug Safety Communication is how the FDA tells the public that what it knows about a medicine has changed. A new risk, a new warning, a new limit on use.
The live index lists 2020 onward. Its oldest entry is dated 14 January 2020.
Under Resources the page offers this: "Full archived versions of Drug Safety Communications published before 2020". That link goes to web.archive.org.
A federal agency is pointing at the Internet Archive for its own back catalogue. Nothing is hidden and nothing was deleted. Old pages get retired, which is ordinary site maintenance.
The effect is still worth naming out loud. Part of the public record of American drug regulation is now kept by a nonprofit.
Worth asking
Looking for a pre-2020 safety notice about your medication? Follow that archive link rather than assuming none exists.
Source
Drug Safety Communications — US Food and Drug Administration (2026)
Read the source: https://www.fda.gov/drugs/drug-safety-and-availability/drug-safety-communications
How this was scored
- Study design
- not recorded
- Funding
- not recorded
- Published in
- not recorded
- Sample size
- not recorded
- Preregistered
- not recorded
- Conflicts disclosed
- not recorded
- Independent of proponent
- not recorded
- Retracted
- No
We have not finished checking this source, so there is no scoring to show yet. “We have not checked this yet” and “this is disputed” are different statements, so no scored band is shown rather than a low one.
Read the full scoring rubric, including what it can't tell you.
Published August 31, 2026.
Questions
How strong is the evidence behind this?
Resolv rates this source "not yet assessed". We have not finished checking this source. No judgement either way. One caveat travels with that badge: The register here is disclosure, not accusation, and the row is written to keep it that way. Retiring old pages is ordinary site maintenance, the FDA states the pre-2020 position itself rather than concealing it, and no claim of deletion or suppression is made anywhere on this row. What is stated is the effect: part of the public record of American drug regulation is reachable only through a nonprofit archive. The reader draws the inference. Note also that the older fda.gov path for this index (.../drug-safety-and-availability-drug-safety-communications) now 404s in its own right; the live address is the shorter one this row cites. The score is calculated from recorded facts about the source — study design, funding, publication venue, sample size, preregistration — not typed in by an editor.
What is the source for this?
Drug Safety Communications — US Food and Drug Administration (2026). The full source is linked on this page so you can read it yourself.
Is this medical advice?
This is information to bring to your prescriber, not medical advice and not a reason to change anything on your own. Nothing here is an instruction to stop or reduce a medication. If you are in crisis, call or text 988.
This is information to bring to your prescriber, not medical advice and not a reason to change anything on your own. Nothing here is an instruction to stop or reduce a medication. If you are in crisis, call or text 988.