Health committee  Madam Chair, I should say that the specific reasons are still unclear. Having said that, in the government's third report on the economy to Canadians, the $500 million was marked with an asterisk, which basically indicated “due diligence”. To be perfectly honest, given some of the scrutiny that has been placed on eHealth Ontario, it's hardly surprising that any government would want to do further due diligence on an organization like Canada Health Infoway, although we're not in the same business as eHealth Ontario.

Health committee  Let me answer your last question first. The answer is no. We didn't give any money to eHealth Ontario. We don't even have a contract with them. We have a contract with the ministry. The funding model that Infoway employs is a funding model that basically pays for results. If you don't get results, you don't get the federal funds.

Health committee  Yes, that is the case. At this stage, the money hasn't flowed.

Health committee  Madam Chair, thank you for this opportunity to be invited here today for the presentation of the results of our recent audit by the Auditor General of Canada. With me today is Mr. Mike Sheridan, our chief operating officer. I want to start by complimenting the Auditor General and her staff for what we believe is a thorough, balanced, and transparent audit conducted on Canada Health Infoway.

Finance committee  Thank you for that question. Actually, we're already having a significant impact on those areas. For example, 80% of Canadians now don't have an X-ray film any more. These are now digitized, which means that wherever the X-ray film is taken and digitized, it can be read from everywhere else.

Finance committee  Let me start off with what the money will do for them. To date, the federal government has given $2.1 billion through Infoway. That money has typically leveraged another $2.1 billion of jurisdictional funding, when all is said and done. Had the first ministers not come together in 2001 and created this national organization, we would be in a stall situation, and a stall situation in health care is not good.

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm the president and CEO of Canada Health Infoway. I have with me Mr. Sheridan, the chief operating officer of the corporation. Mr. Chairman, I'd like to begin by thanking you and the members of the committee for the opportunity to speak with you today about the federal government's recent budget allocation of $500 million to Canada Health Infoway.

Health committee  Mr. Chair, I will ask Mr. Sheridan to address that since he's intimately involved in the project.

Health committee  Mr. Chair, before I answer your question directly, I should say that we have a primary role, and the primary role is basically to provide better care at the point of service. The primary role includes the prevention of adverse drug events. Earlier on, we had a comment about the cost.

Health committee  In terms of reporting, there are many pilot studies that we invest in to look at the feasibility of things that have never occurred before, and one of them is adverse events reporting. We are investing in a study with British Columbia right now in a neonatal unit. Since the process started, the adverse reporting has tripled in terms of the reports that they were filing earlier on, and the follow-up has been substantial as well.

Health committee  Mr. Chair, let me speak first to the approach. I've been in health care for nearly 25 to 30 years, both at the provincial and at the national level, and I've never seen as high a level of cooperation between the federal government, the provinces, and the territories as around this initiative.

Health committee  Mr. Chair, I'm not in a position to address the legislation, but I am in a position to tell the committee that for the first time in Canada, we are now setting up databases on drugs and on other products that will have all people and all drugs. So even if you wanted to do true post-market surveillance prior, you didn't have the information to do that type of work.

Health committee  You've asked a lot of questions. Let me just stop and say, look, we're trying to run a 21st century health care system with 19th century paper. And there is absolutely no security in the paper world. Papers are used on movie sets and they fly all over Toronto--actual medical records.

Health committee  Veuillez m'excuser. I'm going to answer in English, but my colleague over here might want to add something. First, these numbers haven't been pulled out of the air. The numbers have basically been derived from two major studies, one by Booz Allen, one by McKinsey & Company. Also, we have similar sorts of numbers when studies have been taken in the U.S., certainly when projects like this have been rolled out in the NHS system in England, and certainly in the Scandinavian countries, etc., and in Australia when they've done the numbers.

Health committee  Bonjour, Mr. Chair and members of Parliament. With me today is Mike Sheridan, our chief operating officer. On behalf of Canada Health Infoway, I want to thank you for the opportunity to contribute to your study on post-market drug surveillance. Since we don't have too many opportunities to appear before you, I'd really like to take the liberty of telling you about some of the important work we're engaged in, work that I believe will transform the delivery of health care in Canada.