When Dr. Carolyn Dean and I were here we met with a number of you--we gave you copies of our book, Death by Modern Medicine, and we'll provide copies to any member. We requested that there be a federal death registry created that would provide mandatory coroners' forms to ensure that the cause of death, regardless of whether it was from parachuting, or prescription drugs, or cosmetics...to provide not an opinion-based, but an evidence-based mandatory death registry with an input form that makes sure the data is as accurate as possible. So whether my daughter wants to go parachuting or skydiving, or whether someone wants to take a drug or not, or a mammogram, or fluoride, whatever it is.... There are so many issues that families are trying to make informed choices on now. Without having an evidence-based federal death registry, it's impossible. You have a bureaucrat with one viewpoint; you have a naturopath with another; you have a consumer. It's all opinion-based, which is very dangerous when you're making decisions that could be life-threatening to you or your loved ones.
So we strongly suggest that a federal death registry be set up. Obviously, the confidential information would be hidden, but it would be web-based so that everybody could go in and look at the risks.
We commissioned a study in 2004 that did the risk management across all activities in society, and our group would be pleased to provide a copy of that report to each of the members of this committee so they can see what we're talking about.
Then there have to be proportionate risk regulatory regimes. Take, for instance, peanuts. You probably don't realize that peanuts kill an average of 3.5 people in Canada a year. We suggest that we need to have a peanut standard so that anything that causes deaths equal to or greater than peanuts is in federal regulations and anything less is in provincial regulations--or not regulated at all if it's below a 0.5 threshold. It would sort out the jurisdictional issues between the provinces and the feds, and it would sort out the appropriate way to truly protect Canadians.
Thank you.