Georgetown, 7 December 2023 (PAHO) - PAHO´s Member States and regional partners have renewed their efforts to strengthen local production capacities in the region. As part of these actions, a PAHO team visited Guyana on 21-23 November 2023 with the purpose to provide support to the efforts of Guyana in strengthening its regulatory capacities for local production.
During this mission, meetings were held with the Honorable Minister of Health Dr. Frank C.S. Anthony to present the findings of this technical cooperation and to identify the next steps to advance with the strengthening regulatory capacities for local production.
This technical cooperation mission is part of PAHO’s collaboration with the Ministry of Health of Guyana to advance the work from previous missions by PAHO/IMT. The visit provided technical support on the Guyana's draft Drug Act and its draft regulations considering international standards and best practices along with the Ministry of Legal Affairs. PAHO is providing support to the Government Analyst from Food and Drug Department through an assisted self-assessment against the WHO Global Benchmarking Tool and establishing an institutional development plan based on Guyana’s national context. This collaboration aims to enhance Guyana´s regulatory system to achieve greater maturity, which is a key component to generate local production ecosystems.
As Guyana advances towards the strengthening of the local production capacities, PAHO presented a proposal for cooperation in planning and development of a health technology cluster to the Minister of Health. The proposal outlines steps for conducting a comprehensive study, planning activities, and ensuring necessary technical documentation to acquire a master plan for constructing the cluster. Additionally, the proposal includes short-term deliverables for training and qualification of human resources within the scope of a potential cooperation.
The PAHO technical team, from the Department of Innovation, Access to Medicines and Health Technologies (IMT), consisted of personnel from the Quality and Regulation of Medicines and Health Technologies Unit (IMT/QR) and the Special Program for Innovation and Regional Production Platform (IMT/RP).
This mission was supported by Global Affairs Canada (GAC).
IMT is responsible for promoting, coordinating, and implementing the Organization’s technical cooperation in access and rational use of quality medicines and other health technologies. IMT works across all categories of medicines and health technologies, including medicines, vaccines, diagnostics, medical equipment, blood products and organs for transplantation. It supports countries in addressing barriers to access, addressing challenges across the medical product’s full life cycle, strengthening regulatory capacity and supporting evidence-based decision making and rational use through health technology assessment.
IMT consolidates action in the development of pharmaceutical and other health technology related services and leads efforts in innovation through the regional platform to advance the manufacturing of COVID-19 vaccines and other health technologies, increasing regional capacity in the research and development of priority health products, and supporting the generation of ecosystems to enable development, production and access to medicines and other health technologies.
