"In a blunt deregulatory maneuver, the Trump Administration in its waning days is attempting to adopt a regulation that, if finalized, would have a cataclysmic effect on the public health and consumer protection regulatory landscape.

In early November, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) proposed a rule that would impose an automatic sunset provision on all regulations adopted and administered by HHS, its subagencies, and virtually all of its programs. HHS set a 30-day comment period, which ended on December 4, 2020, for comments on the proposed rule.

Under this proposal, thousands of regulations would automatically expire ten years after their enactment, while many of the rules currently on the books would sunset as well, unless individually reviewed and validated again by HHS within a two-year window.

The proposed rule will be costly for the agency and, ultimately, for the public."

Mia Cabello writes for the Regulatory Review December 21, 2020. [2]