Yes. I already emphasized that there are many countries, actually, with very successful commercialization mandates that do not have, in similar research-funding agencies, members of the pharmaceutical industry directly on the governing body. So there's no inherent requirement to have someone for successful commercialization.
It's basically a judgment call about the extent to which the significant financial interests that come with being a vice-president of a large pharmaceutical company will create conflict with respect to the specific mandates of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. And it's important to emphasize here that the Canadian Institutes of Health Research report to the Minister of Health, unlike, for example, Genome Canada and some of the other federal funding agencies that report to the Ministry of Health. So if you think about the mandate of the CIHR, it is clearly to improve the health of Canadians and Canadian health care. And it is there that the significant conflict of interest exists.
It is true that many people have conflicts of interest. But it is actually inappropriate to qualify the conflict of interest that Dr. Prigent has as a conflict just like those of other people. None of the people on the governing council of the CIHR actually have in their professional lives, in their professional obligations toward their universities or towards research, obligations that can actually contradict what the CIHR is about. And that is actually the conflict of interest that Dr. Prigent has, as has been highlighted by the fact that the pharmaceutical industry actually has a primary mandate and a primary obligation towards its shareholders.
The bottom line is that it has to be profitable. And this has, in the past, led to regulatory transgressions and ethical transgressions. So it's basically a question of balance. Will the CIHR be able to provide some balance and promote independent research with a focus on improving the health of Canadians? I think that's really the issue. And so the conflict of interest that Dr. Prigent has is not of the same nature, actually, as that which anybody else on the governing council could have.