With due respect to Doctors Cameron, Gerson, and Sekaly, we would like to differentiate the pilot-scale manufacturing capacity from the full-scale vaccine facility. As the report--and not us, per se--said, the pilot-scale manufacturing capacity was available to researchers globally, so it really comes right down to the point of a judgment call on value for money. That's really what the bottom line was: is it better to spend the $88 million for the many other needs in moving candidate vaccines forward, or even discovering effective HIV vaccines, than to spend it on duplicating something in Canada that could have many benefits on the Canadian scene and moving that forward? A value judgment was made, and what we are really here to relay to you is that the value judgment came down on the side of spending the money otherwise.
On April 13th, 2010. See this statement in context.