Professor Alasdair Breckenridge has been appointed as chair-designate of the new Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), the health minister, Lord Philip Hunt announced. In April 2003, the MHRA will be created from a merger of the Medicines Control Agency (MCA) and the Medical Devices Agency. The MHRA will be responsible for the regulation of medicines and healthcare products. Its primary objective will be to protect public health by taking all possible steps to ensure that medicines, healthcare products and medical equipment are safe for those who use them.

Announcing the appointment at a meeting with representatives of the pharmaceutical and healthcare products industries, Lord Hunt said: "I am delighted that Alasdair Breckenridge will be the first chair of the MHRA. As a member of the Committee on the Safety of Medicines since 1984, and its chairman since 1999, he has an excellent understanding of the regulation of pharmaceutical products. I know that he will build on this, in his important and high-profile new role, to acquire an equal knowledge and expertise of the regulation of medical equipment.

"The MHRA will also benefit from Alasdair Breckenridge's experience in the NHS. He has been both a member and chairman of a Regional Health Authority (before these became part of the regional offices of the NHS executive) and a member of a local Health Authority."

Professor Breckenridge said, "I am pleased to have been offered this exciting, new challenge and look forward to my new role within the merged agency. Like the Medicines Control Agency and Medical Devices Agency, I have no doubt the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency will be a leading organisation with public safety its top priority."

Professor Breckenridge's particular responsibilities will include representing the new agency and its decisions in public, as well as overseeing the Board and the strategic management of the agency. He will participate in the recruitment of the MHRA's first chief executive and its new Board, which will involve, for the first time, a number of external members as non-executive directors.