Drug Safety: COVID-19 Complicates Already Challenged FDA Foreign Inspection Program | NLM

Disaster Information Management Research Center | NLM

Drug Safety: COVID-19 Complicates Already Challenged FDA Foreign Inspection Program

06/02/2020 12:00 AM EDT

Source: U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). Published: 6/2/2020. This 31-page Congressional testimony describes how the outbreak of COVID-19 has called greater attention to the United States’ reliance on foreign drug manufacturers. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) began to postpone almost all inspections of foreign manufacturing establishments in March 2020 due to COVID-19, and the testimony explains that this lack of foreign inspections removes a critical source of information about the quality of drugs manufactured for the U.S. market. (PDF)