Food and Drug Administration vs European Medicines Agency: Review times and clinical evidence on novel drugs at the time of approval

Abstract

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and European Medicines Agency (EMA) now have expedited review procedures for new drugs. We compared the review times of medicines licensed by the 2 agencies and explored differences in the evidence submitted. In 2015-2017 the FDA licensed 113 drugs, 66 of which reached Europe. The median review time was longer at the EMA than FDA and was shorter for drugs undergoing FDA-expedited programmes compared to the same drugs approved by the EMA through the standard procedure. We identified differences regarding the evidence submitted to the 2 regulators for 7 drugs. The greater use of expedited programmes by the FDA and administrative time at the European Commission mainly explain the later access of new drugs to the European market. The additional evidence submitted to the EMA is generally scant and limited to a few drugs.

Keywords: drug regulation; health policy; therapeutics.

Figure 1

Median total review time in days for novel drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the period 2015–2017 and the European Medicines Agency (EMA) by March 2018