Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you for being with us today, Minister. My question will be much more political than financial in nature.
However, it is a question that has a very significant effect on the finances of the provinces in the area of health. The provinces have to deal with problems arising from policies that have been adopted. In only the past five years, Health Canada's Special Access Program, which is intended to provide access to special instruments and drugs, has provided surgeons who so request on behalf of their patients with silicone gel breast implants.
However, as many as 67% of the requests submitted to that program concern silicone gel implants. But those implants were prohibited in 1992, and Health Canada has not approved them to return to the market. The problem is that the same program also has a mandate to provide certain drugs to people who need them.
As a result, six persons with HIV/AIDS who had requested drugs in April were denied access to those drugs, which could have saved their lives. And yet this program is supposed to enable Canadians to obtain drugs where they are not on the market, where they have not yet been approved or where other therapies have not worked.
Minister, I don't understand how priority can be given to the fitting of breast implants for women who have small breasts or a few ripples caused by implants filled with saline solution. When I think of people whose lives could end because they're denied access to drugs that could save their lives, I don't see how we can give priority to the replacement or fitting of silicone gel implants. Can you explain that to me?
I'd also like you to tell us whether you intend to repeal this program, at least as regards silicone gel breast implants. The person responsible for the program told us that he was unable to intervene when the physician decided that a given solution was best for a patient. That's what he recently said on television on a CBC program. He said that his role was not to intervene and that he relied on the physician's competence in determining the best solution for his patient. If he relied on the physician's competence in the case of silicone gel implants, why didn't he do the same thing for people suffering from AIDS who need drugs in order to live?