World Health Organization (WHO)

The European Medicines Agency works with the World Health Organization (WHO) on a range of issues:

• medicines intended for markets outside the European Union ('Article 58' medicines);
• the quality of medicines;
• the development of international non-proprietary names (INNs).

Currently, the Agency is working with the WHO on the following initiatives:

• discussions on the possible acceptability of alternatives to paper certificates;
• discussion on possible revisions of scheme, taking the changing needs and expectations of stakeholders, such as international regulators and pharmaceutical companies into account;
• participation in meetings;
• contributing to regulatory capacity-building;
• pharmacovigilance;
• pandemic influenza.

In terms of medicines for children, the Agency took part in the launch of the WHO initiative ‘make medicines child size’.

It is also a member of the Paediatric Medicines Regulators' Network (PmRN), which the WHO set up in 2010. This is a network of national medicines regulatory authorities that promotes the quality and availability of medicines for children and contributes to capacity-building.