We heard testimony from the Patented Medicine Prices Review Board a couple of weeks ago that I thought was quite disturbing. We know Canadians pay the second-, third-, or maybe the fourth-highest prices in the world, and we can't really seem to figure out a good reason for that. One thing we found out was that the comparator countries we're using, the seven countries that include the U.S. and Switzerland, the two highest in the world, lead to an artificially high average. I know there's been some talk to expand that to a more representative sample of 12 countries, and I think they would be more moderately priced.
We also heard that there's a lack of transparency. Drug companies are not compelled to reveal the rebate programs they're giving province to province. Frankly, the companies, even with the comparator countries, are allowed to charge whatever they want. It seems as though there's quite a mess here, and that came out quite clearly from the Patented Medicine Prices Review Board testimony.
Can you update us? When will this new comparator group of countries be implemented? What's being done now, in lieu of having universal public pharmacare, to bring down prices of drugs in Canada?