Thank you very much.
Ms. Priddy.
Evidence of meeting #46 for Health in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was price.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #46 for Health in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was price.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:55 p.m.
NDP
Penny Priddy NDP Surrey North, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I think a year or so ago you had an external evaluation of CIHR, and a number of recommendations were made. Do you think you could comment on--and maybe this is hard to pick--the top three, or ones that you see as the top three you are moving forward with currently?
4:55 p.m.
President, Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Okay, sure. This is in no particular order. I'm trying to think of what's prominent in my own mind, about what's important to me and to moving forward on the international review panel report.
The first one was that they recommended some clarity of governance issues. Where are some of the funding decisions being made? Is it a governing council? Is it at the scientific directorate table?
We've accepted that recommendation of clarity. So what we've done already is reorganize the committee structure under governing council. We've created a new committee called the research and knowledge translation committee, which will be the point place where final funding decisions are made on grant allocation, after council makes its envelope decisions.
They also recommended that council devolve that border between governance and management decisions down to management, so that council becomes more of sort of a governing body. Council has a retreat in the summer to discuss that, and has already accepted that, and we are moving forward with that. I think that's a very important recommendation.
I would just say for both of those that one has to keep some history in mind here. For the new organization, not surprisingly, governing council was very hands-on in the early years to make sure that in their judgment this important new organization was moving forward in the right direction.
So the IRP has said everything is going well. It is time for council to devolve down more to management of those issues. Those are two.
On peer review, the IRP also recommended a fresh look at how we do peer review. Peer review involves having other scientists sit around a committee like this and review grants that come in.
It is an issue everywhere in the world. It is a particular issue for us because we've stressed outcomes-driven research, and we've stressed multi-disciplinary research and knowledge translation, and these are more complex to review. So we have struck a committee called planning and peer review that will move forward in looking at how we restructure peer review in this country.
5 p.m.
NDP
Penny Priddy NDP Surrey North, BC
Thank you.
Do you have a plan of evaluation, according to which you want to be in a certain place at a certain time on those three things, that you'll go back to? If the committee were to come back and ask you where you were on this, you could report in 12 months? I'm not suggesting you don't; I would just like to know that you do.
5 p.m.
NDP
Penny Priddy NDP Surrey North, BC
The question earlier was about focus on primary prevention, and that it is a growing area, as it is everywhere, I think, that you look in the health community.
Regarding the area of population health, can you talk a bit about how that fits into whether you see that getting more attention or less attention?
5 p.m.
President, Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Population health, like health services research, is actually one of the four pillars of CIHR, as stated in the parliamentary act that created us.
5 p.m.
President, Canadian Institutes of Health Research
It depends how you measure it. We have an Institute of Population and Public Health that is led by John Frank. In fact, Dr. Frank is now meeting with the Senate Committee on Health, with Senator Keon's committee, as we speak, to discuss public health issues.
So the area of public health and population health is one of those areas that is growing. It has been a very small community in this country historically, so you don't all of a sudden have a public health and population health initiative unless you have people. You don't grow people overnight. They have to be trained, and they have to have positions to go to.
So we are very much in the business of doing that. Dr. Frank has created centres of excellence in population and public health across Canada that are being supported. There are training initiatives in this area, etc.
In addition, the increase--although it is small in absolute dollars, and I agree with you there--in the funding of population and public health since we started is in the order of sixteen-fold in the last seven years. It is a pretty steep increase. In absolute dollars, it is still small, but again I think it reflects the small but growing size of the community.
5 p.m.
NDP
5 p.m.
Conservative
5 p.m.
NDP
Penny Priddy NDP Surrey North, BC
Thank you.
Fraser Mustard and people like that tell me that part of the reason is that we're not training, that there aren't enough people selecting to go into that, and that's why we have a smaller pool.
You can answer just yes or no. Are you doing some work with universities about encouraging people to get into that area?
5 p.m.
President, Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Yes, we are. As I said earlier, we've doubled the amount of money going to training generally. Dr. Frank's institute has created these centres for, really, capacity building on population and public health. Every year, also, that institute has a summer institute on population and public health, again to try to build capacity in that area.
Dr. Frank is a real proselytizer for the importance of population and public health. I think he's doing a super job in trying to do that. I would actually suggest, if I may, that you invite him to come in front of the committee to talk about what he's doing.
The other thing I would add is that I've alluded to obesity, and I think this is one of the strengths of CIHR as being led by our Institute of Nutrition, Metabolism and Diabetes. But as your report demonstrates, you appreciate that much of obesity is a population and public health issue. So although it's led by our diabetes institute, it really is involving everybody, from clinicians to public health researchers, on that important issue.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I have a couple of very quick questions.
You're looking at an increase in planned spending of almost $36 million, I think—is that correct?—and a great deal of that will be devoted to grants and awards.
I see in your presentation that you talked about research on Fabry's disease. Is there $11.6 million going to that research itself?
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
Okay. Has there been money go into that research up to this point, or is this a brand-new study?
5:05 p.m.
President, Canadian Institutes of Health Research
This is a new study. The vast majority of the funds are actually to purchase the drug that is being tested in this case. This was money allocated through Health Canada for us to do that study. It's being done in partnership with Fonds de la recherche en santé du Québec, our counterpart program in Quebec.
The objective of that one study is to evaluate the efficacy of that drug for children with Fabry's disease.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
So it's going to be used on children only, or on adults, with this study?
5:05 p.m.
President, Canadian Institutes of Health Research
I have to check. My guess is that it's largely children, but I'm not sure. I could get back to you on that if you'd like.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
Okay, I would appreciate any information that you could get on that. I happen to have a young gentleman in my riding who is suffering from this disease and has been certainly advocating for years to try to get some support for the drug because of the huge expense that's involved with it.