New OnLine System to Provide Canadians with Quicker Access to Safe Natural Health Products

February 26, 2009

OTTAWA - Colin Carrie, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health, today launched the first phase of Online Solution, a secure online system for processing natural health product submissions, site licences, and clinical trial authorizations for natural health products in Canada.

“Our Government is working closely with the natural health product industry to ensure that Canadians have access to safe and effective natural health products,” said Minister Aglukkaq. “This new world-class online system will speed up consumer access to these products by making the licensing process more efficient.”

“This is an important step in responding to calls from industry and the public for faster licensing of safe natural health products,” said Parliamentary Secretary Colin Carrie.  “It will help ensure that Canadians enjoy a broader selection of these items.”

The Natural Health Products Online Solution contains a world-class fully-searchable database of natural health product ingredients that includes 7,000 acceptable medicinal and non-medicinal ingredients. Natural health product manufacturers will also benefit from pre-cleared information, such as pre-approved ingredient information claims and conditions of use, as the basis for new product applications.

“This initiative demonstrates that Health Canada is committed to co-operating closely with the natural health product industry to upgrade the current system,” said David Skinner, President, NDMAC, representing the consumer health products industry. “Health Canada’s Online Solution will reduce the burden for companies by allowing us to submit multiple applications at the same time and receive licenses or decisions within days.”

“Canada Post is very pleased to bring its expertise in secure message delivery solutions to this important Health Canada initiative,” said Cheryl Persad, Canada Post’s Senior Vice President of Transaction Mail.

The Online Solution initiative is one of a number of measures Health Canada has introduced to improve the efficiency of the application approval process for natural health products.  It is estimated that the new system will significantly reduce the average application time which, to date, has been approximately sixty business days.