PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Amy S. Rosenberg AU - Barry Cherney AU - Kurt Brorson AU - Kathleen Clouse AU - Steven Kozlowski AU - Patricia Hughes AU - Rick Friedman TI - Risk Mitigation Strategies for Viral Contamination of Biotechnology Products: Consideration of Best Practices AID - 10.5731/pdajpst.2011.00820 DP - 2011 Nov 01 TA - PDA Journal of Pharmaceutical Science and Technology PG - 563--567 VI - 65 IP - 6 4099 - http://journal.pda.org/content/65/6/563.short 4100 - http://journal.pda.org/content/65/6/563.full SO - PDA J Pharm Sci Technol2011 Nov 01; 65 AB - CONFERENCE PROCEEDING Proceedings of the PDA/FDA Adventitious Viruses in Biologics: Detection and Mitigation Strategies Workshop in Bethesda, MD, USA; December 1–3, 2010 Guest Editors: Arifa Khan (Bethesda, MD), Patricia Hughes (Bethesda, MD) and Michael Wiebe (San Francisco, CA) Viral contamination of biotech product facilities is a potentially devastating manufacturing risk and, unfortunately, is more common than is generally reported or previously appreciated. Although viral contaminants of biotech products are thought to originate principally from biological raw materials, all potential process risks merit evaluation. Limitations to existing methods for virus detection are becoming evident as emerging viruses have contaminated facilities and disrupted supplies of critical products. New technologies, such as broad-based polymerase chain reaction screens for multiple virus types, are increasingly becoming available to detect adventitious viral contamination and thus, mitigate risks to biotech products and processes. Further, the industry embrace of quality risk management that promotes improvements in testing stratagems, enhanced viral inactivation methods for raw materials, implementation and standardization of robust viral clearance procedures, and efforts to learn from both epidemiologic screening of raw material sources and from the experience of other manufacturers with regard to this problem will serve to enhance the safety of biotech products available to patients. Based on this evolving landscape, we propose a set of principles for manufacturers of biotech products: Pillars of Risk Mitigation for Viral Contamination of Biotech Products.