BVA outlines proposals for EU-UK vet agreement and solutions to secure vet medicines access in Northern Ireland

The new policy position supposes that no agreement is reached between the two parties ahead of the current post-Brexit grace period extension on veterinary medicines concludes at the end of this year.

The BVA said finding a solution was “becoming increasingly urgent” as it proposed three main interim proposals for Northern Ireland medicines:

- Re-routing through the Republic of Ireland. If pharmaceutical companies re-routed veterinary medicines destined for the Province through Dublin directly from their place of manufacture in the EU instead of via Great Britain there would be no need for relabelling with a new Marketing Authorisation Holder (MAH) or re-batch test. Some pharmaceutical companies have already started doing this, it said.

- Applying exceptions to allow all or at least some veterinary medicines that were aligned with regulation before Brexit to continue to be supplied to Northern Ireland without having to have the MAH location changed or re-batch tested, with newly-licensed veterinary medicines then adhering to EU rules.

- Developing a Special Import Certificate (SIC) scheme for Northern Ireland to allow the import of products from outside the European Economic Area that are currently used, such as the botulism vaccine, into the Province as well as any products from GB that may be needed.

BVA President Elizabeth Mullineaux urged the UK government to act quickly to find solutions, both by way of a broader EU-UK veterinary agreement and specific migrations to the problems facing the Province.

“A veterinary agreement with the EU could have an incredibly positive impact on so many different areas of concern, but in particular could finally lead to a permanent resolution to the long-standing question of future access to vital veterinary medicines in Northern Ireland,” she said.

“Without a solution, there are serious implications not only for animal health and welfare, but also for public health.

“We urge the government to recognise the seriousness of the situation, to engage with the veterinary profession, and to carefully consider the solutions and mitigations we have set out to avoid potentially devastating consequences.”

The BVA also published a second new policy position to reduce the wider post-Brexit trade friction, including tackling the risk of imported disease and offering protections for animal health and welfare.

The current lack of a veterinary agreement and the checks imposed following Brexit on all goods of animal origin and live animals has already had a considerable detrimental impact on animal health and welfare, disease surveillance and data sharing, said the association.

The veterinary profession has also been put under significant pressure since the introduction of health certifications and physical checks, issuing about one million Export Health Certificates (EHCs) since the checks came into force.

The UK has also lost access to key databases to monitor disease outbreaks and protect the UK’s biosecurity, the BVA said.

In the long-term, the BVA suggests an EU-UK veterinary agreement based on the principle of dynamic alignment – where parties to a trade agreement maintain equivalent regulatory standards to each other – such as the EU-Switzerland agreement, but with enough flexibility to diverge in legislation.

This could help the UK to maintain high standards of biosecurity, animal health and welfare as well as facilitating trade and reducing the pressure on the veterinary workforce, it said.

Daniel Zeichner, Minister of State at the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, assured the BVA recently – when speaking at the association’s annual London Dinner – that the government’s manifesto commitment to an EU-UK veterinary agreement still held.

However, the association said it was critical that the government got the detail right to ensure its success, and that it moved quickly.

Finding a solution to resolve the issue of future access to veterinary medicines in Northern Ireland before the end of the extended grace period in December was “unlikely” it said.