Conferences

A healthy diversity of different types of players and plenty of space for scaling up are among the reasons that investors remain interested in the consumer health sector, according to investment bankers speaking at the recent AESGP Annual Meeting.

The European OTC market grew at double the rate of the global market in the last twelve months, according to IQVIA Consumer Health, driven by a long-term trend for prevention. Consultancy Simon Kucher identifies a desire to live a longer, healthier life as the primary concern behind this trend.

Limited capacity and a two-to-three year timescale for reformulation could mean that many VMS supplements disappear from the market, warns EPPA partner Alexandra Bocquillion, speaking at the AESGP Annual Meeting in Warsaw, Poland.

If the European Commission is serious about improving the competitiveness of the European Union, it should ditch the idea of making commonly used OTC antimicrobials like thrush treatments and cold sore creams prescription-only, warns Greek Medicines Agency president Evangelos Manolopoulos

“It's really the elected officials who are making the final determination on what happens. They're really the owners of the teams, you guys in the industry are playing the game we’re refereeing,” FDA Commissioner Robert Califf says at Consumer Healthcare Products Association conference.

“We've had several citizen petitions. We can't ignore the data that are out there and are very new since the last time FDA had looked at this back in 2007,” says FDA OTC drugs office director Theresa Michele.

The US cosmetics industry, particularly small- and medium-sized businesses, should reach out to their representatives in Congress to encourage pressure on the US Food and Drug Administration to implement cosmetics reform, despite agency staff cuts.

Personal care, EU government reps discussing a planned revision of the 2006 European Union Suncare Recommendation are pushing for a legally binding text, rather than the recommendation, and considering broadening the definition for sunscreen.

French SME association COSMED will push the European Commission for a “clear checklist” and criteria on how substances in the Cosmetic Products Regulation are assessed by Member States, as well as more clarity on the exemption process and timelines.

Single-use packaging producers should heed the 1 October deadline in Colorado’s EPR law for paper and packaging to register with Circular Action Alliance lest they face enforcement action, said an advisor for that organization, which is leading the program’s administration, at IBA’s Cosmetics Convergence Fall 2024 Virtual Symposium.

The National Advertising Division of the BBB National Programs, Inc. closes two personal care ad claim challenges through its Fast-Track SWIFT Program in November, with the total number of assessments on that track in 2024 reaching 21.

The BBB National Program Inc. expects to double the number of National Advertising Division SWIFT reviews completed in 2023 compared with last year as stakeholders grow more comfortable with the process. At its annual conference in Philadelphia 19-20 September, NAD said it is speeding up the time it takes to complete both SWIFT and standard track reviews.

Attorneys presenting at the Personal Care Product Council’s 2024 annual meeting outlined measures beauty companies can take to protect their IP and combat counterfeiting operations. While marketing of sham products is not going to stop, companies can cultivate “a reputation within the counterfeiting community of being one of the brands that genuinely understands how to disrupt counterfeiters.”

The United Nations treaty on plastics pollution, considered ‘the most important climate deal since Paris,’ stands to have a direct impact on the cosmetics industry, potentially by targeting intentionally added nano-plastics in addition to microplastics in cosmetics, says attorney Melissa Kopolow, who spoke at the Personal Care Products Council’s annual meeting in Miami on 27 February.