Evidence of meeting #24 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was million.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
—so this was not like buying a standard product.
The reason I say “evolving” is that we're not entirely sure of what Spartan's plans are going forward. To date they have not delivered any test to the federal government. That doesn't mean they won't in the future. That's why I'm saying that it's evolving.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Robert Gordon Kitchen
Thank you, Mr. Matthews and Mr. McCauley.
We'll now go to Mr. Kusmierczyk for six minutes.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you very much, Mr. Matthews. We heard today that Pfizer delivers its vaccine shipments directly to the provinces. Can you give us a sense of what the turnaround time is for Moderna in terms of when it arrives in Canada and how long it takes for those vaccines to be shipped to the provinces?
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
As was mentioned, Pfizer delivers directly to the POUs that the provinces indicate. The model with the other vaccine companies is different. It is indeed brought in by a federally contracted service provider, FedEx and Innomar. The deliveries typically start for Moderna the day after. Depending on the proximity to where they arrive, it may be a couple of days for more remote locations, but generally speaking they start the day after.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
You mentioned the POUs for Pfizer. Can you just explain that to us?
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
Basically, provinces inform the Public Health Agency of Canada of the locations where they would like the vaccines to be delivered. Pfizer is willing to deliver to multiple locations. There's a process in place to inform Pfizer of where the doses are going. They deliver directly to those locations. It's up to each province to determine the locations.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
That's interesting. If the province wanted to designate, let's say, the Windsor-Essex County Health Unit as a POU, could they do it that granularly, or are there only one or two or three POU locations?
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
I don't think it's an infinite number, but certainly it's more than two or three that provinces can indicate.
My colleague Ms. Reza can perhaps offer some additional context on the volume of POUs in play.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
I just wanted to know whether it can be sent, or has been sent, directly to health units, for example.
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
It can be. I can't speak to actual locations.
Arianne might have more context there.
Arianne Reza Assistant Deputy Minister, Procurement, Department of Public Works and Government Services
I can confirm that it can go to multiple points. I think at last count it was somewhere in the hundreds. The provinces and territories add points of administration. It can go to a granular level, as was indicated.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Just to clarify here, if we want to cut out the middleman and send it directly to the Windsor-Essex County Health Unit, that is a possibility, but that is the decision of the province. Am I correct?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Procurement, Department of Public Works and Government Services
I think that question is best placed to our health official colleagues.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Okay. That's not a problem. I just wanted to know whether it's the province's decision to state where it will end up.
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
Just to answer the question, the decision does rest with the provinces and territories.
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
There are limits in terms of how many, but it's more than two or three, as Arianne mentioned.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Okay. Perfect. That's very, very enlightening.
Can we get an update on the Medicago vaccine candidate? Where are we in that process? I know that's probably a question for Health Canada and PHAC; I just want to know where we are in that process.
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
Medicago is still going through trials. They're an interesting candidate in terms of the technology, being protein-based. We don't have any firm dates on when they'll pass through the various hurdles, but they're still going through trials. It's certainly something that we're keeping an eye on.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Okay, great.
It underlines having a diverse portfolio of seven vaccine candidates, with 400 million doses. It was a smart strategy, knowing that there would probably be bumps in the road with supply and that maybe, with some of the delays, it would be smart to take an additional look at some of the vaccines before they were released. Was that a good strategy?
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
There is diversification across a number of fronts, and I would say that number one is the various platforms. Pfizer and Moderna have a similar platform. Then there's Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca, with the viral vector, and for the more traditional protein subunit, there are the Novavax, Medicago and Sanofi candidates. There's diversification there, which is important, because it wasn't clear which vaccines would be successful early on, and indeed some are still going through the hurdles.
There were also questions about the ability of industry to scale up: Even if you have a successful vaccine, how quickly can you manufacture at scale? Again, diversification is important. The location of manufacturing and getting some spread there is important as well.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
How much is the province contributing to the purchase and procurement of vaccines? I'm just curious.
Deputy Minister, Department of Public Works and Government Services
To date, the federal government has been funding the vaccine efforts in terms of both the vaccines and the supplies that go with the vaccines.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Okay. Thank you for that.
Locally, in Windsor—Essex, a number of companies have pivoted to produce PPE. I'm thinking of Papp Plastics, face shields from Harbour Technologies, and Windsor Mold Group, for example.
On March 24, the minister told the committee that over 40% of PSPC's contracts for PPE, by dollar value, are with Canadian companies. What proportion of federal COVID-19 supply contracts is now with Canadian companies?
