All right. It is because I would like to give you an accurate answer.
We are presently looking at our resource base, further to the AG's report and further to the investments that have been made in the past. We're considering what resources we need to carry out our regulatory responsibilities in an effective and modernized way. That work and those discussions are ongoing at this moment.
There is no question that there is an issue of resources. We're looking at a variety of mechanisms to address that, because it is important for us to make sure we can carry out our work in a way that meets the expectations and needs of Canadians. So we're hoping in the next few weeks to come forward with a response to the public accounts committee. We've done a comprehensive review of our programs and services further to the AG's report. We have some consultations that have been under way on our cost recovery regime, which has also been outdated since the mid-1990s.
What we're suggesting is that there is a need to transform the way we regulate health products in this country, so that we can meet the needs of Canadians now and in the future and keep up with our international partners, because we are lagging behind our international partners. We need to do that in a responsible way and make sure there's sufficient attention focused not just on the pre-market but on the post-market.
In my view, this life cycle approach we're talking about is really transformative in terms of our taking a drug and not just being reactive and looking at it at one point in time, and then just putting it on the market and letting market forces, in this case Canadians, actually experience these adverse effects and bear the consequences of our decisions. So what we're saying is that with the life cycle approach we will be monitoring these drugs and health products throughout their life cycles, so that when these get out into the real world, they are past the clinical trial stage and there are people using them who are very young, very old, with a number of other health conditions, whom we can monitor, and so that we have the regulatory foresight. The latter is not a blunt instrument. Yes, we can always recall a product.... Actually, in this case, we can't, as we don't have the legislative authority to recall a health product in this country, which I personally find absolutely appalling.
So what we're saying at least is that instead of just using that, can we just calibrate what we need to do.