Germany abandons certified MedTech products from Switzerland

Breathe a sigh of relief to Swiss medical technology companies: Your association has found a way for Swiss manufacturers to continue selling their products in Germany.

Artificial hip joints, breast implants or medical masks: at the end of May, the EU ended the recognition of Swiss medtech products. The backdrop was the failure of the framework agreement. More specifically, these are products that have been recognized by the Swiss certification body SQS.

The trade association Swiss Medtech reacted to this with two campaigns: On the one hand, it offered the 54 Swiss manufacturers with SQS certificates a platform to join forces. Eight of them then lodged a complaint with the General Court of the European Union. Instead, it has tried to influence market surveillance authorities in other EU countries through national associations, as it wrote on its website on Tuesday. The aim was “to get EU states to oppose the European Commission’s ban on SQS”.

Germany accepts Swiss certification
According to the industry association in Germany, these efforts have now resulted in success. Germany accepts Swiss certification. According to this, Swiss manufacturers are allowed to resell their medical technology products with SQS certification in Germany without an agreement. “For us, it is very important and crucial that Germany is the first country to say that Swiss certificates are still valid,” Daniel Delfosse of Swiss Medtech said on the “SRF” program “Heute Morgen” on Wednesday. “We hope that this will now have a signal effect.”

Germany did not justify its decision. They would have simply said that the certificates should not be legally invalid. “It is also our conviction. The European Commission wrongly declared them invalid,” Delfosse is convinced. The Bharat Express News