The 27th Annual Meeting and the 27th Technical Committee Meeting of the Global Harmonization Working Party (GHWP) were held in Shanghai from Nov 27 to 30. Li Li, Commissioner of China's National Medical Products Administration (NMPA), attended and addressed the event.

Li said that as a major country in the medical device industry, China has seen continuous progress in the research and development and innovation of medical devices and the formulation of related laws, regulations and standards, and conducted extensive international exchanges and cooperation in medical device regulation, effectively promoting the high-quality development of the industry. 

Noting that the GHWP is an important international organization of global medical devices, he said the NMPA will participate in the work of the GHWP more deeply.

The NMPA will strengthen exchanges and mutual learning with regulatory authorities worldwide, jointly accelerate the convergence, harmonization and reliance in the regulation of global medical devices, and support global medical device technological innovation and cooperation, so as to make more contributions to building a global community of health for all, he said.

During the meeting, Xu Jinghe, Deputy Commissioner of the NMPA, and Muralitharan Paramasua, chief executive officer of the Medical Device Authority (MDA) under the Ministry of Health of Malaysia, jointly signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in medical devices between China's NMPA and Malaysia's MDA. The two sides reached consensus on further enhancing exchanges and cooperation in the regulation of medical devices.

This is the first GHWP annual meeting held in China since Xu was elected the GHWP chair. Over 600 representatives from more than 25 countries and regions worldwide participated in the event. The four-day meeting focused on accelerating the convergence, and harmonization and reliance in the regulation of global medical devices.