Draft an executive order that will keep sick children off Death Row.

President Obama should have his lawyers draft an executive order that will keep sick children off Death Row. In that order he should direct the FDA to convene an advisory committee with several ethicists and a hefty dose of patient advocates to advise the FDA on a public list of experimental drugs presumptively approvable under the compassionate use exemption. The current compassionate use rules are fine as far as they go, but they do not address the nontransparency that enables unpredictable decisions that cause unnecessary deaths. Compassionate use has become an entitlement of the Washington elite; for instance, if you are a relative of a member of Congress seeking a compassionate use exemption, you can expect that an FDA official will immediately call the company in question.