Thank you, Mr. Chair, and my thanks to the witnesses.
I'm going through the IMS documents. I'm sorry I wasn't here for the actual presentation, but I've scanned the presentation.
I'm interested in a couple of general things that are beyond your brief. The duty to notify, of course, keeps coming up in our work here as a committee. We're rapidly approaching the end of the study on PIPEDA and we'll be making recommendations, so I would appreciate a brief comment from both of the witnesses as to how they feel about that.
The other thing is the transborder transfer of information. There are some jurisdictions that will not allow the transfer of data to jurisdictions that don't have comparable protections. That would be of interest to me too.
Specifically on IMS, Ms. Fineberg, I notice that on page 3 of your speaking notes, you say your business is to “provide information products and services to governments, researchers, health providers, regulators and the private sector—pharmaceutical and biotech companies—to support the safe and effective use of medications”, and so on. Is there ever a case in which the pharmaceutical and biotech companies want to know from you not personal information but information regarding frequency of claims of certain types of drugs or the experience of certain types of treatments in certain jurisdictions, so that they can have an idea which products are more popular, which are being used, etc.? Is that one of the information services you might offer to the pharmaceutical and biotech industries?