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With the aim of expanding the manufacturing environment of pharmaceuticals and vaccines, the Guyana Government is turning to the European Union (EU) for assistance to strengthen local systems, Health Minister, Dr Frank Anthony has disclosed.
He made this revelation on Wednesday at the opening of a TAIEX INTPA Regional Workshop on EU-Caribbean Regulatory Systems for health products. TAIEX is the Technical Assistance and Information Exchange arm of the European Commission.
The two-day workshop is being hosted by the EU Delegations to Guyana and Barbados in collaboration with Guyana’s Health Ministry and the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA). It aims at strengthening the European Union-Latin American and the Caribbean (EU-LAC) partnership on health resilience and vaccine production.

Delivering the remarks, Dr Anthony said the discussions during the workshop would help Guyanese, as well as Caribbean authorities, identify the regulatory gaps and start putting the right framework in place with the right type of regulations in order to create the enabling environment to expand pharmaceutical manufacturing and start vaccine manufacturing in the Region.
“We also recognise that if we’re going to do pharmaceutical [and vaccine] manufacturing here in Guyana, we need to understand what is it we need to put in place to be able to do pharmaceutical [and vaccine] manufacturing,” he noted.
According to the Health Minister, the Guyana Government recognises that the challenges that will come in preparing the local environment for such expansion. He reminded that the country has been manufacturing and continues to manufacture pharmaceuticals, which are exported to countries like the United States.

“So, we have some amount of work that has been done over the years [to be able to manufacture and export pharmaceuticals]. What we want to do now is expand it [to manufacture vaccines] and we think with the right partners, with the right persons, with the right teams in place, we can make that expansion,” he noted.
Already, Guyana has been receiving assistance from the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO), which has deployed two experts to Guyana to conduct an assessment of the local environment in order to ascertain what is needed to ensure that the country can do pharmaceutical and vaccine manufacturing.
“So, with that report and the findings from that report, we will have a basis to understand what are the things we need to invest in, how we should invest; what we should do first; what we should second and so forth, so that we can build that infrastructure and get this process started,” the Health Minister stressed.

Excited about prospects
Dr Anthony went on to outline that all the other international organisations that Government has been working with in this process, such as the EU, were excited about the prospects of collaborating on this type of work.
Turning his attention to the EU workshop, the Health Minister noted that all the Caribbean nations should participate in this initiative, which is beneficial to understanding the various systems that exist internationally.

“The EU is very rule-based and we can learn from them some of the rules that they have, good practices that they have and to measure our systems to see where are we in terms of those rules so that if we feel we’re falling short, we can lift those standards to meet globally-recognised and accepted standards,” he noted.
During the two-day workshop, key stakeholders from the European and Caribbean regions are being brought together in Georgetown to discuss regulatory strengthening as it relates to pharmaceutical and vaccine manufacturing as well as to explore opportunities for collaboration.
TAIEX supports public administrations with regard to the approximation, application and enforcement of EU legislation as well as facilitating the sharing of EU best practices. It is largely needs-driven and delivers appropriate tailor-made expertise to address issues.
Head of the EU Delegation to Guyana, Ambassador Rene Van Nes highlighted that TAIEX was a powerful tool with more than 2500 EU experts available to offer much-needed assistance in a number of areas. Under this programme, more than 17,000 public officials across the globe are being trained.
“I’m really happy with the colleagues from Italy, Spain, Lithuania and from the EMA (European Medicines Agency) that are here today to share their insights and their knowledge when it comes to rules and regulations, and the EU legislation and best practices on pharmaceutical production… So, it’s all about the transfer of knowledge and of course, regional integration and cooperation – something that the EU is all about [because] there is nothing else that binds us together,” the EU Ambassador asserted.
On this note, Van Nes expressed his delight at the fact that there were representatives from various Caribbean countries at the workshop. (G8)