National Defence Committee on Dec. 3rd, 2013

[Tarik Brahmi, NDP, Saint-Jean, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Fortin, we are asking you a lot of questions about post-traumatic stress, but I don't think that is your area of expertise. My understanding is that your primary mandate is to do research on technology.

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

Our mandate is to provide the Canadian Armed Forces with the best opinions, knowledge and technologies so that they can deal with all the challenges that come their way. That includes both mental health and technology, such as armoured vehicles and sensor technologies on the military side. We live in an era where technological needs are greater than ever. Platforms are more technologically complex than they have ever been. Even a relatively small calibre weapon is much more complex than it was in World War II.

[Tarik Brahmi, NDP, Saint-Jean, QC]

Okay.

What percentage of your research does post-traumatic stress disorder represent?

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

The exact PTSD percentages in terms of personnel and investment will be included in the information we are going to send to the committee.

[Tarik Brahmi, NDP, Saint-Jean, QC]

Very well.

I would like to talk more about the technology transfer.

I thought your mandate was centred on basic research first and on applied research second. I am guessing that you do not have the required budget to commercialize or industrialize the solutions that you find. So you have no choice but to participate in technology transfer.

To stay with the issue the committee is studying, the care of ill and injured Canadian Armed Forces members, let me ask you if you have developed or discovered technologies that you subsequently transferred to Canadian companies capable of producing systems designed to save lives and prevent the injuries of soldiers deployed to battlefields.

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

Mr. Chair, that is a great question.

You are absolutely right. Defence Research and Development Canada is a research, not a commercialization organization.

New technologies and inventions are commercialized through Canadian and sometimes foreign private industry. We are transferring technologies to those companies to enable them to provide equipment to the Canadian Armed Forces and to the Department of National Defence.

In health care, we are currently working on developing vaccines and antidotes for chemical and bacteriological agents. As you know, there are serious concerns that those types of weapons might exist in Syria, for instance. These are complex challenges and it is not easy to find solutions.

Canada is one of the leaders, if not the leader, in shaping the Medical Countermeasures Initiative, which has prompted four countries to work together. We have called upon the Surgeon General of the United States, the health care services of the various armed forces in the four countries and the public health care services to work together on identifying and creating antidotes and vaccines to protect our Canadian Armed Forces against viruses or toxins used as chemical weapons abroad.

Clearly, those same viruses can also spread to civilians, so we are working with public health organizations to collectively develop those antidotes and vaccines. We do not commercialize the vaccines.

[Tarik Brahmi, NDP, Saint-Jean, QC]

I'm sorry to interrupt you, but I only have a few seconds left. Is this trend likely to increase? If not, do you think it will diminish in the future in relation to the budgets you receive? That is my last question.

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

Which increase are you talking about?

[Tarik Brahmi, NDP, Saint-Jean, QC]

I am talking about the increase in the budgets that you plan to invest in future technology transfers.

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

The budgets will sometimes be allocated to technology transfers. There is no specific budget for the transfer itself. It depends on the case. When an opportunity arises, we are going to support the technology transfer.

[The Chair, Conservative, Peter Kent]

Thank you, Mr. Fortin and Mr. Brahmi.

Mr. Bezan, the floor is yours.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and welcome to our witnesses. It's good to have DRDC here.

In our last study on readiness we actually visited DRDC in Downsview. A number of us on committee got to see some of the work that you're doing first-hand, both from the standpoint on equipment and on survivability of our troops.

We had Major Ray Wiss here at committee back in the spring. A lot of us are familiar with him because of his books, FOB Doc and Line in the Sand. He was one of the first to use ultrasound equipment in theatre at a forward operating base to help improve survivability. From my understanding when we toured Downsview, there is research happening on trying to bring in more diagnostic equipment even at the level where, instead of just having it at an FOB, a medic would be able to carry it into theatre and would be able to enhance the survivability of those who are wounded in action.

Now I know, Colonel Tremblay, that your areas of expertise as the director of science and technology personnel is in medical interventions, medical countermeasures, combat casuality management, diagnostic technologies, and casualty care.

I know that often we get tied up talking about PTSD and operational stress injuries. Part of the study, though, was also looking at how we deal with traumatic injuries.

Can you talk about the research that you're doing that may have also occurred in theatre? Can you also talk about what we're doing here in Canada to ensure that our soldiers who are wounded in action are getting the best possible care because of research and breakthroughs provided through DRDC?

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

Thank you for the question.

You have visited Toronto, so I speculate that you have seen first-hand the ultrasound devices that are being developed there. We're trying to adapt the technology to work in the theatre of operation, to be able to enhance the 3-D ultrasound diagnostic tools that are available to medics on site. That technology is still in development. This is work that we continue to do to make that technology portable, rugged enough to be able to deploy, and reliable enough, of course, to deploy in theatre.

Another example that comes from Toronto is the formulation of a new intravenous saline treatment that is administered. Especially when a soldier has experienced loss of blood and loss of fluids, we need to inject saline, an IV as we call it. We have modified the saline package to be able to make it more portable, and that solution is now deployed in theatre. It is a technology that was developed through DRDC and is now deployed in theatre.

As you asked about the training that we provide, we're also working to support deployment of our troops by training them to deal with live agents, with toxins and chemical and bacterial warfare agents, again, a concern in the context of Syria. This is an example of how we adjust our research program to make sure that our men and women in uniform are best equipped to deal with whatever threat they're going to be faced with. In Suffield we do work on protection against chemical and biological warfare agents. The military can be exposed to conditions simulating those agents and we train them to properly deal with those things.

Lieutenant-Colonel Tremblay, do you want to add anything?

[LCol Roger Tremblay, Project Manager, Personnel Protection Research, Defence Research and Development Canada]

Well, yes, maybe I can give a couple more examples.

We are doing research with stem cells in Suffield with the hope that we can improve the treatment of burn injuries.

As part of the blast injury program, we're looking at crush injuries that can happen as a result of being caught under a vehicle for a long period of time. These are happening more and more in theatre. This is another example of what we do that has a direct impact in these operations that we've recently undertaken.

[The Chair, Conservative, Peter Kent]

Thank you, Colonel Tremblay.

We're down to our final five-minute segment of questions in this hour.

Mr. Larose, the floor is yours.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

You mentioned IEDs and the impact they have on vehicles.

Mr. Fortin, you mentioned the study dealing with the troops. In addition to the physical injuries caused by an armoured vehicle going over an improvised explosive device (IED), can you tell us a little about the studies you have done on the psychological impact?

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

The studies on the psychological impact try to cover all the factors that increase the stress levels experienced by soldiers. An explosion under a vehicle is a source of stress, in a larger sense. Of course, just being in a theatre of operations also causes stress.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

It is basically a detection issue. One of the problems with IEDs is that you never know where they are.

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

The constant pressure and uncertainty or even constant stress can contribute to potential mental health problems.

We have worked very hard, with our allies in particular, to successfully detect and diffuse more IEDs in theatres of operations. Once again, that problem is very difficult to solve. None of the allied countries have managed to solve this problem once and for all.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

I have another question for you.

The theatre of operations in Afghanistan is being dealt with. The same goes for Iraq. Are your reports on IEDs for those two countries only? For instance, did the French have any in Mali? Are there any reports showing that, once a lethal method proves to work, it is used elsewhere?

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

We clearly work with intelligence services to identify new threats and new weapons deployed in various parts of the world. The co-operation between the intelligence services of the five partners is extremely positive. They share the information so that we can develop solutions before our personnel is in a theatre of operations.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

So reports actually identify IEDs outside those two theatres of operations.

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

Yes. There are IEDs outside those theatres of operations and they remain one of the major threats to the deployment of personnel. According to our intelligence reports and the experts we are working with, this threat will be around for many more years.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

Even in a theatre of operations with the United Nations or elsewhere, the threat is still there.

[Dr. Marc Fortin]

Yes, it is very present and significant. That is why we are still working on it, even though we are no longer in a combat mission in Afghanistan.