FDA's current drug shortages, by therapeutic area and dosage form

On Oct. 30, 2026, FDA's drug shortage database listed 69 drugs as currently in shortage. Forty-nine of them were injections, and two more were sterile powders that hospital pharmacists dissolve for IV use. Of the 18 left over, seven carried FDA's Psychiatry tag, and every one of those seven is taken by mouth.

GxRadar sorted the list by the therapeutic categories FDA assigns to each shortage and by dosage form, using the agency's records as published through the openFDA drug shortages API¹. Most of what is short is used in operating rooms, intensive care units and IV nutrition. Among the pills, the largest group is attention-deficit medicines.

That split explains why a shortage can be front-page news for anesthesiologists and invisible at a retail counter, and why the people who notice first are often hospital pharmacists. The full, searchable list is on our shortage tracker.

How FDA tags a shortage

Each listing carries one or more therapeutic categories, part of the record-keeping described in our explainer on how FDA tracks drug shortages. FDA's shortage FAQ² says the label "is meant to describe labeled indications and populations in which the drug is commonly used, for example Pediatrics," and "does not indicate FDA approved status." A drug can carry several. Of the 69 current shortages, 45 have a single tag and 24 have two or more. Dexamethasone injection, a steroid used across hospital medicine, has 10.

Because of that overlap the 69 drugs carry 121 tags between them, so the shares in the table add up to well over 100 percent. Read each row as "how many current shortages touch this area."

Source: GxRadar analysis of openFDA drug shortage records¹ with status "Current" as of Oct. 30, 2026. "Unavailable or limited" counts drugs whose most-reported presentation status was unavailable or limited availability. Years listed are counted from FDA's first-posted date to Nov. 3, 2026; our piece on how long drug shortages last uses the same measure. FDA's FAQ notes that an available status "is not an FDA determination that the shortage has been resolved."

Operating rooms and pain control

Every one of the 10 anesthesia shortages and all 11 in analgesia and addiction are injections. They include local anesthetics (bupivacaine, ropivacaine, lidocaine and a lidocaine with epinephrine combination), sedation and induction drugs (midazolam, dexmedetomidine, etomidate), the paralytic rocuronium, and a group of injectable opioids including fentanyl, morphine, hydromorphone, sufentanil and remifentanil.

These are also among the oldest entries. The median listing in both categories has been open for 8.7 years. Injectable morphine and hydromorphone were first posted on Oct. 31, 2017, and bupivacaine on Feb. 20, 2018. Fentanyl and atropine injections carry a first-posted date of Jan. 1, 2012, a round-number date that probably means "on or before." Our piece on the longest-running drug shortages covers that caveat.

Opioids bring in a second agency. Federal production quotas for controlled substances are set by the Drug Enforcement Administration, and FDA's shortage report to Congress for 2025³ says its shortage staff contacted DEA on 30 occasions that year about potential shortages.

IV fluids, nutrition and the Pediatric tag

Pediatric is the single most common tag, on 17 of the 69 drugs. That does not make the list a children's formulary. Fourteen of the 17 are injections, and most are hospital basics that also carry metabolism or gastroenterology tags, such as dextrose in four concentrations (5%, 10%, 50% and 70%), sodium acetate, sodium bicarbonate and sterile water. Those same fluids and additives make up seven of the 10 Gastroenterology entries and six of the eight in Endocrinology/Metabolism.

We covered the pediatric entries one by one in Pediatric drug shortages, and the 2024 disruption in IV solutions in The 2024 IV fluid shortage.

Oncology has eight entries, six of them injections, including carboplatin (first posted April 28, 2023, during the episode described in The 2023 cancer drug shortage), methotrexate, azacitidine and ifosfamide, which was added June 12, 2026.

The pills on the list

Outpatient drugs are a small, specific slice. All seven Psychiatry entries are oral, and five of them are stimulants used for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder: mixed amphetamine salts tablets (first posted Oct. 12, 2022), lisdexamfetamine capsules and chewable tablets (July 14, 2023), and two extended-release methylphenidate products. The other two are clonazepam tablets and isocarboxazid tablets.

Stimulant supply is also tied to DEA quotas. FDA's 2025 report describes a July 2024 FDA letter asking DEA to raise the lisdexamfetamine quota, which DEA granted that September. Two years later, both lisdexamfetamine listings are still marked current, though most of their presentations are reported as available.

Cardiovascular has a few oral entries too: quinapril tablets and a quinapril and hydrochlorothiazide combination, both posted Jan. 19, 2023, and furosemide oral solution, added March 31, 2026. Furosemide injection has been listed since April 2020. Pharmacy prices for the common tablet are on our furosemide page.

Source: GxRadar analysis of openFDA drug shortage records as of Oct. 30, 2026. Shares are rounded.

Why the hospital injectables keep coming back

FDA's own explanation is about capacity. Its FAQ says that "with fewer firms making older sterile injectable drugs, there are a limited number of production lines that can make these drugs," and that when one company has a problem or stops making a product, "it can be difficult for the remaining firms to increase production quickly." The shared mechanics are explained in Why sterile injectables dominate shortage lists.

Federal economic research points the same way. In its 2019 root-cause report⁴, FDA found that 63 percent of the 163 drugs that went into shortage from 2013 to 2017 were injectables, with a median time since first approval of almost 35 years. In the year before going short, the median price per unit was $11.05 for those injectables and $2.27 for the oral drugs. An HHS analysis from December 2024⁵ counted an average of five manufacturers per molecule for generic injectables against nine for generic oral drugs, and found that 70 percent of recently launched generic injectables had not reached profitability by their third year. A much older HHS issue brief from 2011⁷ had already noted that supply and demand for these products respond little to short-term price changes.

Injectables' share has edged up. It was 63 percent of new shortages in FDA's 2013 to 2017 sample and 71 percent of current listings in October 2026, though the two numbers measure different things (new shortages over five years against a snapshot of what is still open).

How this compares with earlier snapshots

An HHS white paper from April 2024⁶ said there were 123 drugs in shortage as of January 2024 and that analgesics and anesthetics made up 17 percent, anti-infectives 12 percent and cardiovascular drugs 13 percent. That paper grouped drugs differently from FDA's tags, so the shares cannot be lined up row for row. The total has fallen to 69. At the end of 2025 FDA counted 93 ongoing shortages across its drug and biologics centers, according to the 2025 report³, and only four new shortages during that year.

FDA's reason field says less than the categories do. Federal law, at 21 U.S.C. 356e⁸, lists seven reasons FDA can assign, from manufacturing-quality requirements to a demand increase. In the openFDA records, 30 of the 69 current entries give "Other" and six give no reason. Of those that do name one, demand increases lead with 15, followed by discontinuations (six) and active-ingredient shortages (five).

FDA says in its FAQ² that its shortage staff update the list daily. The agency's next annual shortage report to Congress is due by March 31, 2027, under the reporting section reproduced in the 2025 edition³. For what to ask when a medicine you take appears on the list, see What to ask when your medicine is in shortage.