My first question deals with the concern that exists around the cost of health care delivery. We are all concerned about escalating costs. We're over $103 billion, I guess, in terms of what's spent just on the publicly administered health care delivery.
Currently drugs represent one of the highest and most rapidly escalating costs of health care delivery, and governments have a legitimate interest in managing those costs. But one of the other things is making sure that publicly reimbursed programs include verifying that they're good value, relative to the benefits, over existing therapies.
I would say that one of the challenges in evaluating the value of new therapies is the lack of, or limitations of, evidence that these drugs work for the patients in the long term and fulfill the provinces providing better health and quality of life. In relation to cost containment, we're worried about adverse drug effects and reactions. Often it takes time to evaluate the full effects of medications on patients, particularly those who have chronic conditions.
In my home province of British Columbia, the provincial government has taken the innovative approach of actually paying pharmacists double the prescription fee, or subscription fee, or—what do we call it now?