Health Committee on May 15th, 2014

[George Da Pont]

In my experience, not all provinces want direction and guidance, but the main mechanism is as the minister noted—the regular meetings that she has with all of the provincial health ministers. They identify areas of common concern, areas where they can work together. Prescription drug abuse is one, or looking at bulk buying of drugs. There is a variety of things that are carved out in that process, where the federal government and the provinces work together, looking at, as the minister said, having the innovation panel looking at this more broadly and seeing what ideas there are for best practices and things that we could adopt, either best practices that are already under way in some part of this country or from abroad.

I think that will be a catalyst, hopefully, to look at some of these issues on a broader basis.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

I think it's important that Canadians recognize that the federal government does not have that power or that direction to deliver to provinces. It's up to the provinces to deliver that.

[George Da Pont]

Yes.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

I think sometimes that gets lost in this place here especially. Your role is not one to tell the provinces how to spend the money. We do send them the money in the transfers on the health and social side of things, but the actual direction on how to spend it is the responsibility of the provinces, and how they do it or don't do it becomes their responsibility.

[George Da Pont]

Exactly.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Certainly more research and innovation in just those two areas that I as a layman would understand has to mean tremendous savings in the provincial health care systems in hospital stays for patients.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Libby Davies]

You have 30 seconds left, if you want to use it.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

I'll give it up.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Libby Davies]

All right. Thank you very much.

We'll move back to Dr. Morin.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Thank you very much.

I'll continue my questions to Dr. Taylor. We had an interesting discussion about the MERS-CoV.

First of all, thank you for saying that you do monitor this very closely. I want to make sure, are you working with the provinces to ensure we are prepared nationwide?

[Dr. Gregory Taylor]

Absolutely. We have a variety of mechanisms to work with the provinces and certainly directly with the public health network. I co-chair the council of that. This is a topic of great concern. In fact, we have a special meeting with all the chief medical officers of health on Friday, tomorrow, to address this very issue. We're watching the measles outbreaks and how to best deal with that, and MERS-CoV as well, and the topic of H7H9, H5. These things are consistently followed.

Those are formal mechanisms. We have informal mechanisms at the technical level where we're constantly in touch with the provinces and territories. Typically, for example, the chief medical officer will call me or send me a personal e-mail in a particular province. You saw the things in the media yesterday. We were given a heads-up by the province, very personally, very quickly.

So it's a variety of formal mechanisms and informal mechanisms that keeps us well connected across the country.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Do you feel that you have enough resources to ensure an appropriate emergency response?

[Dr. Gregory Taylor]

Yes, we are well resourced to do that. We work with the provinces and territories; this is that joint capacity that exists.

Over the last few years, the provinces and territories have also built their own capacity. We now have three different public health agencies across the country. My understanding is that some of the provinces are toying with creating their own, again, so from a resource perspective, I think Canada is very well positioned.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Thank you.

I would like to go back to maternal health. I have the data that I didn't have before and that you don't have either.

On May 6 the World Health Organization released a report concerning the millennium development goals that the United Nations set for 2015. The report is pretty clear that, if we look at the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births over a 20-year period, there were six per 100,000 in 1990, seven in 1995, seven in 2000, 11 in 2005, and 11 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births in 2013.

The statistics are there. What do you have to say?

[Dr. Gregory Taylor]

I say that we need to get that report and take it very seriously and see whether there are any underlying issues that we need to address. Thank you for bringing it to our attention. I was unaware of that report, and we will most certainly follow it up very closely.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

What is very troubling about this is that worldwide the death rate has fallen by 45%—that is, globally since 1990—and that in Canada it is on the rise. So please look into this. It would be great if you could get back to us on this issue.

My next question is about food safety. We have heard conflicting numbers on the resources allocated to food safety inspection in this country. We know that the 2012 budget involved $56 million in cuts and the layoff of 308 staff members. Now an almost 10% decrease in projected spending is predicted.

Can you tell us clearly the number of staff at CFIA in 2011?

[Dr. Bruce Archibald, President, Canadian Food Inspection Agency]

I don't have the 2011 number with me, but I do have it for 2012 and 2013.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Please tell us.

[Dr. Bruce Archibald]

The total number of staff in 2012 was 7,291. In 2013 it was 7,119, which is a slight decrease. But I would also point out that the number of the inspection staff increased over that same time period; it went from 3,534 to 3,577.

So you're right, there was a reduction in the overall budget as a result of budget 2012, but the agency looked at a number of different places to find efficiencies and did not reduce the inspection staff or any of the food safety activities.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

So if I understand correctly, there was no decrease in the number of inspectors?

[Dr. Bruce Archibald]

There actually was a slight increase.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Okay, good.

How about the number of inspectors working on raw meat processing lines, such as XL beef?

[Dr. Bruce Archibald]

I don't have the specific numbers, because we don't break it down that way in our counting; often inspectors will do multiple tasks, working on different areas. But we have increased our inspection in the meat program as well as in a number of other areas across the board. Overall, the number of people working in facilities, particularly in meat facilities in Canada, has increased.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Libby Davies]

We're over our time. Thank you, Mr. Archibald.

We have time for one last five-minute question and answer.

Mr. Wilks.

[David Wilks, Conservative, Kootenay—Columbia, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm going to defer my time to Dr. Lunney, who has some more questions.