Drug Manufacturing Alternative Assessment Tools
FDA has published a draft guidance, Alternative Tools: Assessing Drug Manufacturing Facilities Identified in Pending Applications, giving applicants information on how the agency intends to use alternative tools to assess manufacturing facilities identified in an NDA, ANDA, BLA, or supplements to any of those applications. The document says it does not apply to other drug inspection programs including postapproval inspections, surveillance inspections, follow-up and compliance inspections, and bioresearch monitoring inspections.
Under the PDUFA 7 agreement, FDA says, the agency agreed to issue a guidance on the use of alternative tools to assess manufacturing facilities named in pending applications and to incorporate best practices from using such tools during the Covid-19 pandemic.