WHO commends Ghana over regulatory benchmark

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has commended Ghana for achieving Maturity Level 3 (ML3), a global regulatory benchmark set by the organisation.

The WHO last year ranked Ghana’s Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) ML3 for its medicines regulatory system that ensured the safety, quality and efficacy of all medical products imported, manufactured or distributed in the country.

The ML3 is the second highest in the four-tiered WHO classification of national medicines regulatory systems.

Reference agency

Addressing delegates at the virtual opening of the 74th World Health Assembly last Monday, the Director-General of the WHO, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said the milestone would make Ghana a reference agency for issuing marketing authorisations in Africa and beyond.

“Through the WHO Listed Authorities initiative, Ghana achieved Maturity Level 3 last year, meaning it has a stable and well-functioning regulatory system,” he said.

He added that “in future, it will be able to become a reference agency for issuing marketing authorisations in Africa and beyond.”

Global preparedness

Dr Ghebreyesus said the COVID-19 pandemic had exposed gaps in national and global preparedness that must be addressed.

He underscored the need for member states to double their efforts and strengthen their primary healthcare systems to ensure that everyone had access to basic healthcare services.

“This pandemic has been driven by a highly transmissible virus. But it has been turbo-charged by division, inequity and the historical neglect of investments in preparedness,” he said.

The WHO boss indicated that as the world recovered and rebuilt, “we must do more than stop viruses; we must address the vulnerabilities that allow outbreaks to become epidemics and epidemics to become pandemics.”

Possible influenza

Dr Ghebreyesus said although the WHO focused on responding to the pandemic, it continued to work with countries to prepare for a possible influenza pandemic.

He said the COVID-19 pandemic had shown clearly that in an emergency, low and lower-middle income countries could not rely on imports from vaccine-producing countries.

He said several manufacturers said they had the capacity to produce vaccines if the originator companies were willing to share licences, technology and know-how.

“We urge member states and manufacturers to join the WHO COVID-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP), which provides a powerful mechanism for sharing licences in a non-exclusive, transparent way,” he said.

Speakers

Speakers at the opening of the conference underscored the need for the WHO to do more to enhance its preparedness towards future pandemics.

They also urged the WHO to pay critical attention to underreporting of COVID-19 figures, particularly records of deaths to inform quality planning and targeted support.

The speakers further encouraged wealthy nations to support nations that could not afford to procure vaccines in larger quantities, stressing that defeating the pandemic was a collective responsibility.

The United Nations Secretary-General, Mr Antonio Guterres, urged the WHO to bolster primary healthcare systems and universal health coverage.

He cautioned that efforts to recover from the pandemic should not come at the cost of other essential healthcare services, from women’s reproductive services to children’s vaccinations and mental health coverage.

“We are at war with a virus. We need the logic and urgency of a war economy to boost the capacity of our weapons,” Mr Guterres added.