International Trade committee  As I said, the most important aspect is that this be applied prospectively so that the impact will be down the road eight or ten years. The clear impact is that the low-cost generics are going to be delayed two years—that's what the legislation calls for—beyond what they are now, and that is going to have an impact on costs.

International Trade committee  With respect to retroactivity, the provisions of Bill C-30 should apply, in terms of this patent extension or certificates of supplementary protection, only to products approved after the coming into force of CETA. The amendment we have makes that absolutely clear, and I'm hoping it will be done.

International Trade committee  As I said, we're going to be delayed coming to market. The good thing about this is that there was an export clause negotiated as part of CETA. It is in the bill. That mitigates some of the impact. If that is done properly, we're going to continue to push very hard to get investment.

International Trade committee  Generic drug manufacturers are the primary manufacturers in the pharmaceutical industry. As I said, more than 11,000 people develop and manufacture products in Canada and export them to over 100 countries. With a 12-year extension of the patent, the challenges will be greater than they are now.

International Trade committee  There are two aspects to that. From a cost perspective, as I've said, generics on average now are selling at something like 20% to 25% of the price of an equivalent brand-name product. If you delay for two years, you're paying an extra 75% to 80% on that product for an extra two years.

International Trade committee  We're asked that question regularly. The answer depends critically on how the bill is implemented, and that's one of the changes we're proposing. The changes should only apply on a prospective, go-forward basis, which means that extra patent protections should only be given to new drugs approved after the coming into force of the agreement.

International Trade committee  That is correct, and it is one of the proposed amendments we have suggested. Make it crystal clear that the implementation is only to be on a go-forward basis. If you take a $100 million drug—and there are many, many of those in the Canadian market—and you delay a generic competitor for two years, who would sell it at 20% of the price, you're adding $80 million a year just for one drug.

International Trade committee  We shared those with the clerk just yesterday.

International Trade committee  No. The changes we're proposing are all consistent with CETA. It's just the way the changes are being interpreted in the Patent Act. As I said, 30 pages of this bill are about the Patent Act. We have gone through it very carefully and have noted that in some cases changes are not required by CETA; there are housekeeping changes that introduce problems.

International Trade committee  That's what we would like.

International Trade committee  Thank you very much. It's nice to be back here. We were here not too long ago talking about the TPP agreement as well, which also affects pharmaceuticals. The generic pharmaceutical companies in Canada, our industry, are primarily pharmaceutical manufacturers and exporters, and they are among the top R and D spenders across all industrial sectors.

Health committee  Mr. Chair, may I respond very quickly?

Health committee  We have data on the utilization of medicines. Unfortunately, we do not have good data on people who don't take medicines and aren't covered. Our role in the system is to provide good, safe, quality medicines at good prices.

Health committee  As I said, we support the idea of all Canadians having access to the necessary medication. I think that is very important. As most people on the panel have said, it clearly does lead to savings elsewhere in the system. Again, our sector provides headroom for that so that new medications can be afforded.

Health committee  As an organization, as a sector, we actually support more harmonization across Canada. We think widely different programs for drug coverage are not good. If medications work well in one jurisdiction, they should be working just the same in others. We actually have recommended and supported moving toward more harmonized national formularies, what drugs are covered and what drugs aren't.