The Caribbean Public Health Agency/Caribbean Regulatory System (CARPHA/CRS) last month kicked off its work advising Caribbean countries’ governments by assessing and recommending four generic HIV treatments. The recommendations, which follow approval from WHO, included emtricitabine/tenofovir and tenofovir tablets, also known as generic versions of Viread and Truvada (a generic of which also recently won US FDA approval ). The regional initiative is meant to help ...

Australia's Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) on Thursday released guidance on a plan to allow companies to make "very low risk" changes to registered medicines after submitting them to TGA and receiving an automated acknowledgement. "These requests are known as 'notifications' but still require an application to the TGA," the regulator explained. "These lowest risk variations do not require evaluation but legally must still be approved by the TGA before imple...

The World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday announced updates to its essential medicines list (EML), including new recommendations for antibiotic use and the addition of new drugs to treat hepatitis C, HIV and leukemia. The list, which is intended to serve as a model for the most crucial medicines for ensuring public health, is updated every other year based on recommendations from WHO's Expert Committee on the Selection and Use of Essential Medicines. "These medicin...

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) on Wednesday announced that it has accepted five additional therapies to its PRIME (PRIority MEdicines) scheme, bringing the total number of products accepted to the program to 25. The agency also said it denied seven requests for eligibility, which seeks to streamline the development of promising new therapies through earlier scientific advice and increased engagement between EMA and sponsors. While this latest batch of recomme...

This article discusses the difficulties encountered by medical personnel working with refugees in Syria and delivering pharmaceutical products. It describes relevant regulatory policy and guidance for drug procurement and quality. Introduction Providing healthcare aid to civilians during war and crisis is a complicated task. The Syrian war has impacted the healthcare system inside Syria and the neighboring countries. Large and small humanitarian organizations have wor...

Patients in the UK will get early access to AbbVie's experimental pan-genotypic hepatitis C (HCV) drug combination, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) announced Wednesday. The combination, known as glecaprevir/pibrentasvir, is currently undergoing an expedited review by both the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for its potential to treat patients across all six major genotypes of HCV, with or wi...

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) said Monday that it will continue to allow patients to offer viewpoints during the assessments of the benefits and risks of medicines before its Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP). In addition to continuing to invite patients to oral explanations on a case-by-case basis, EMA will also look to use additional methods and consult patients on a more regular basis. "This could include participating in CHMP discuss...

Welcome to our Asia Regulatory Roundup, our weekly overview of the top regulatory news in Asia. Prevalence of Substandard Drugs in India’s Supply Chain Prompts Regulatory Proposals The Indian Ministry of Health has recommended increasing regulatory oversight of government facilities after a survey found 10% of drugs in the state supply chain are substandard. That figure is seven percentage points higher than at retail outlets, raising concerns the government is ...

The European Parliament’s Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI) committee on Tuesday backed a draft report calling on the commission to analyze the impact of intellectual property on pharmaceutical access, as well as review the regulatory framework for orphan medicines, among other provisions. The draft , which a spokeswoman for the European Parliament told Focus that a final version will be made public by the end of this week, covers a menagerie of differ...

The Italian Medicines Agency (AIFA) has banned the supply of certain drugs made by Antibioticos do Brasil (ABL) following an inspection of the company's San Paulo, Brazil facility in December. In total, AIFA cites the company for four critical and seven major deficiencies, including inadequate maintenance and cleaning; poor levels of training and awareness of good manufacturing practices (GMP); and insufficient environmental monitoring. As a result of the findings, AIFA...

The Danish Medicines Agency has suspended Danish parallel importer Europharma DK's manufacturing authorisation and good manufacturing practice (GMP) certificate over "serious breaches of compliance" uncovered during an inspection of the company's Esbjerg, Denmark site last month. According to Europharma DK's website, the company specializes in parallel import of drugs from other EU countries that it repackages and distributes in Denmark, Germany and Sweden. However, the...

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has updated its post-authorization guidance on how extensions of marketing authorizations and type II variations may impact orphan-designated medicines. The updates follow the publication of a new  notice by the European Commission on the application of Articles 3, 5 and 7 of Regulation (EC) No. 141/2000 on orphan medicinal products . In this notice, the European Commission provides guidance on the application of the Orphan Regulation,...