Medicines regulatory science expertise in Africa: workforce capacity development and harmonisation activities towards the establishment of the African medicines agency

dc.contributor.authorDube, Admire
dc.contributor.authorNcube, Bakani Mark
dc.contributor.authorWard, Kim
dc.date.accessioned2022-05-19T13:24:08Z
dc.date.available2022-05-19T13:24:08Z
dc.date.issued2022
dc.description.abstractThe medicines regulatory landscape in Africa is undergoing transformation with at least two countries having National Medicines Regulatory Authorities (NRAs) that operate at World Health Organization (WHO) maturity level 3. However, this represents the exception as over 90% of African NRAs have limited capacity to perform core medicine regulatory functions, have a shortage of competent regulatory professionals, have high staff turnover, lack diversity of scientific expertise, and have staffing shortages relative to the high workload. A systematic approach to developing the regulatory workforce is therefore crucial to addressing the existing shortfalls in regulatory capacity, particularly at this time when efforts are underway to operationalise the African Medicines Agency (AMA). In this article, initiatives that are building African NRAs’ regulatory capacity and developing their workforce are reviewed in preparation for work to be conducted by the AMA. We found that the African Medicines Regulatory Harmonisation (AMRH) initiative has been at the forefront of capacity building and workforce development mainly through the designation of specialised Regional Centres of Regulatory Excellence and the implementation of medicines regulatory harmonisation initiatives in regional economic communities. In addition, some NRAs within high-income countries and trusted institutions have been supporting regulators in low-income countries with registration assessments and facilitating access to quality-assured medical products through their stringent review procedures (SRPs). Capacity building has subsequently been facilitated through this active involvement of African regulators in SRPs. This article also provides recommendations for further capacity building and workforce development. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.en_US
dc.identifier.citationNcube, B. M., Dube, A., & Ward, K. (2022). Medicines regulatory science expertise in africa: Workforce capacity development and harmonisation activities towards the establishment of the African medicines agency. Pharmaceutical Medicine, 36(2), 83-97. doi:10.1007/s40290-022-00425-zen_US
dc.identifier.uridoi:10.1007/s40290-022-00425-z
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10566/7439
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherAdisen_US
dc.subjectNational medicine regulatoryen_US
dc.subjectAfrican medicine agencyen_US
dc.subjectWorld health organisationen_US
dc.subjectRegional centersen_US
dc.titleMedicines regulatory science expertise in Africa: workforce capacity development and harmonisation activities towards the establishment of the African medicines agencyen_US
dc.typeArticleen_US

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