Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Minister for Communications, Urban Infrastructure, Cities and the Arts) Share this | Hansard source

The Therapeutic Goods Amendment (2020 Measures No. 2) Bill 2020 amends the Therapeutic Goods Act to implement a range of measures to support the delivery of the highest quality health care for Australians and to promote the health and wellbeing of Australians. In particular, the bill removes a potential impediment to the Australian government's response to the COVID-19 pandemic in relation to the importation and supply of COVID-19 vaccines in Australia. It also introduces measures to improve access to therapeutic goods for Australians and to enhance patient safety.

The bill supports continued access to medicine where there is a serious scarcity of a medicine in Australia, improves the safety of therapeutic goods in Australia by providing for the introduction of a unique device identification database and related requirements to trace medical devices, and enables the ratification of international agreements that protect human health relating to therapeutic goods.

The bill supports Australian Public Service employees to lawfully obtain, possess and convey goods, licit or illicit, for the purpose of determining compliance with the therapeutic goods regulatory scheme, clarifies aspects of the data protection scheme for assessed listed medicines and makes other minor amendments. I thank members of the House for their contributions to debate on this bill.

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