Veterinary Medicines Directorate - Responsibilities

Responsibilities

The VMD is responsible for:

• the assessment, issue and maintenance of all national Marketing Authorisations for veterinary medicines in accordance with European Community and UK legislation;
• acting as rapporteur/co-rapporteur or reference member state/concerned member state for designated European applications for centralised or decentralised authorisations;
• controls on the manufacture and distribution of veterinary medicinal products including inspections;
• pharmacovigilance through the surveillance of suspected adverse reactions (SARs), through the Suspected Adverse Reaction Surveillance Scheme (SARSS) - veterinary surgeons fill in form VLM252A;
• surveillance for residues of veterinary medicines in animals and animal products;
• the provision and implementation of policy advice on these matters to the Health and Agriculture Ministers who jointly form the Licensing Authority for veterinary medicines under the Medicines Act 1968;
• the management of the Research & Development (R&D) programme linked to veterinary medicine issues; and
• the co-ordination of Defra’s work in the area of antimicrobial resistance via the DARC Group, including development of a Government Veterinary Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance Strategy.