The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control {NAFDAC} volunteered last year at the last meeting in Morocco to host the Third African Medicine Quality Forum (AMQF) meeting.
The meeting will take place at the Transcorp Hilton Abuja from the 24th- – 28th February, 2020.
The AMQF was established in 2017 as a Technical Working Group of African Medicines Regulatory Harmonization (AMRH) that is jointly domiciled at AUDA-NEPAD and WHO, Geneva as joint secretariats. The goal is to build and strengthen the capacity of African countries in medicines quality control and regional post marketing surveillance which in turn, will contribute significantly to reducing sub-standard and falsified medical products in circulation in the African markets.
AMQF is expected to drive the harmonization of Quality Control (QC) standards and practices and, ultimately the mutual recognition of QC tests among African countries. It is a platform for a holistic continental quality control agenda that facilitates sharing of best practices, an advocacy platform to raise the national and international visibility of National Quality Control Laboratories ((NQCL)
AMQF membership is open to heads of NQCLs from all African countries and formally reports to the African Medicines Regulatory Harmonization (AMRH) Steering Committee.
This meeting will convene all members of the AMQF including its Technical Committee (TC), leadership from USP, AUDA-NEPAD, WHO, Regional Economic Communities (RECs), Regional Health Organizations (RHOs) as well as other partners and key stakeholders.
The meeting is sponsored by World Bank, NAFDAC, West African Health Organisation (WAHO), Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), AU-NEPAD, United States Pharmacopeia (USP) World Health Organisation (WHO) and manufacturers. The theme for this year’s meeting is “2020: PERFECT VISION FOR QUALITY OF MEDICINES IN AFRICA”.
Among the objectives of the Abuja meeting are:
Reinforce the importance of quality control laboratories in post marketing surveillance
Strengthen regional/cross border collaborative survey of medicines in Africa as a means of protecting public health.
Familiarize Regional Economic Communities with instrumentation and analytical techniques to facilitate convergence for ensuring quality of medicines.
Complete the roadmap for strengthening National Quality Control Laboratories infrastructure and systems to help make informed, reliable and consistent regulatory decisions.
Emphasize the importance of Quality Control in the entire drug approval process: Manufacturing to Post-marketing.
Sensitize National Medicines Quality Control Laboratories on the importance of drafting laboratory strategic and business plan to ensure continual provision of Quality Control testing that meet international standards of quality.
Develop proposal to ensure that National Medicine Quality Control Laboratories have the required legal mandate and well-defined scope of activities.
NAFDAC advocates daily for quality of medicines in the nation’s supply chain through strengthening of our internal capacities, such as having quality control laboratories with modern equipment with trained personnel, strong post marketing surveillance, inspection of manufacturing facilities, and enforcement using international best practices.
NAFDAC looks forward to support and collaboration from all stakeholders in delivering safe and quality medicines, and all Nigerians towards a successful hosting of this continental meeting.
I believe that at the end the meeting, the Heads of Quality Control Laboratories from the over 35 African countries would have achieved a clearer picture of the importance of the NQCLs and their convergence for collaborative reliance at the regional and continental levels. This realization will ensure that substandard, falsified and counterfeit drugs products will be reduced to a minimum.
