A few days ago, the International Conference on Harmonisation published a
report on the ICH Meeting held in Brussels on 11 and 12 May. In this
report, ICH informed among others about further activities in the field of
the "Quality" guidelines. After recently publishing the two
guidelines ICH Q8 "Pharmaceutical Development" and ICH Q9
"Quality Risk Management" as step-2 documents, an informal
Expert Working Group of ICH now deals with the subject of "Quality System for
Continuous Improvement". For some time now, there have been
discussions about the possibility to publish an ICH Q10 guidance on this
topic. The Steering Committee has asked for a detailed business plan
before the formal work on this guidance can begin.
In the past, the US-American FDA, which is a member of ICH next to EMEA
and the Japanese medicines authority, stated that the topic of
"Pharmaceutical Quality Systems" could well become the title of
a worldwide harmonised guideline. How high this topic is ranking in FDA's
priority list is shown by the publication of the
Draft "Guidance for Industry: Quality System Approach to
Pharmaceutical Current Good Manufacturing Practice Regulations" in September 2004.
Dr Lester Crawford, FDA's Acting Commissioner and thus the highest
representative of this organisation, gave a topical lecture which also
covered the subject
of "Improving Manufacture Practices" before the Food and Drug
Law Institute on 7 April 2005. In this lecture, he pointed out that:
"Good manufacturing practices are not only vital to business success; they are also essential to FDA and they are essential to the public health.
The FDA's overhaul of the pharmaceutical cGMPs encourages manufacturers to modernize their methods, equipment and facilities that will help eliminate both production inefficiencies and undue risks for consumers.
Our initiative also implements tougher inspections rules to make them more targeted and effective."
With reference to the closure of a manufacturing plant for vaccines in
England due to GMP deviations, he stressed the importance of FDA's
co-operation with other authorities (in this case the MHRA).
Therefore, the FDA currently supports a further harmonisation of GMP
standards. Harmonisation via ICH is one step to reach this aim. In
addition, the Agency is considering another possible step: becoming a
member of PIC/S (www.picscheme.org).
Apart from this, the FDA is obviously having a look at completely new
models. FDA is examining the possibility to open offices outside the
USA! Until very recently, articles of that content published in
pharmaceutical journals were held to be false reports. Now the English
journal Scrip (one of the most reliable media in the pharmaceutical
environment) quotes Dr Lester Crawford as follows:
"We are asking for more funds in this budget for this kind of
activity and we also are shifting personnel in order to be able to do
this. The only glitch in the three years I've been back [at the FDA] that
needs desperate fixing is that sometimes we have to go into areas to do
these inspections ... where the State Department cannot guarantee our
safety."
The article continues:
A spokesperson for the FDA told Scrip that the agency's
"international responsibilities and travel requirements have
increased not only in frequency but also in scope in terms of the places
we go to conduct inspections and to work with our international
counterparts on global public health issues." However, Dr Crawford
was not available to amplify his remarks "due to his full
schedule", the spokesperson said.
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