Evidence of meeting #1 for Health in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cases.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:20 p.m.
NDP
4:20 p.m.
Conservative
Matt Jeneroux Conservative Edmonton Riverbend, AB
On a point of order, Mr. Chair, we're already 45 minutes into this. We entertained the routine proceedings so we could get a structure for today's meeting. However, it does say that the committee “shall proceed to a briefing from officials on the Canadian response to the outbreak of the coronavirus” immediately following the election of the chair and vice-chairs. I would suggest perhaps revisiting Mr. Davies' motions at a later date. We have officials here and I think we need to hear from them immediately.
4:20 p.m.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Actually, with great respect to Mr. Jeneroux's comments, it is the standard practice of all committees to proceed to the adoption of routine proceedings immediately after the election of the chair and vice-chairs, and it's never put on the agenda. I think the clerk will confirm that, if we ask.
It's not literally taken on the agenda. That is automatically what the committee has to do. We're not really able to be fully functional and able to proceed until we have our rules of engagement voted on. That's why it's not on the agenda, and that's why it's perfectly in order to continue.
4:25 p.m.
Liberal
Marcus Powlowski Liberal Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON
Could I make a request? Let's do it, then, but let's do it really quickly. I agree with Matt. We're here and this is an urgent situation; the epidemic, at least internationally, is certainly of significance. We want to start dealing with this issue today and not be bogged down in procedure for a day or two days.
4:25 p.m.
Conservative
Matt Jeneroux Conservative Edmonton Riverbend, AB
Yes, I obviously agree, but I would like to go directly to bringing in the officials, even if it requires a motion, and perhaps deferring this to the end of our meeting to go through the remainder.
I believe you would agree, Mr. Chair, that we have the necessary structure in place to go forward with the questioning. I think this is an unusual and special instance. We have these officials here today, and we really don't want to waste any more of their time but move directly to lines of questioning. I'm happy to move a motion if that's what's required, but I would hope that there would be a friendly amendment and we could just have the officials, if you would entertain it.
4:25 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
I think Mr. Davies has precedence here for his motion.
Let us hear the motions, please.
4:25 p.m.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
There are several items that were in the routine motions from the last Parliament, which I don't think will be controversial, and one other matter that just governs the in camera proceedings. If it is the will of the committee to revisit these issues at our next meeting, I'm happy to do that, with the understanding that we do not consider the routine motions of this committee closed until we've had a chance to fully consider all of them.
4:25 p.m.
Some hon. members
Agreed.
4:25 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Okay, that's what we will do.
Let's go back to the matter of being televised. Is it the will of the committee to allow these meetings henceforth to be televised?
4:25 p.m.
Some hon. members
Agreed.
4:25 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
We're going to suspend the meeting to ask the witnesses to come forward.
4:30 p.m.
Liberal
Sonia Sidhu Liberal Brampton South, ON
On a point of order, Mr. Chair, I would like to suggest that the committee agree to continue our briefing next week on Monday and Wednesday with the witnesses. If the opposition wants to bring any witnesses, they can send the names to the clerk. As I said, there would be the president of CBSA, Public Safety, Global Affairs Canada, Foreign Affairs, Transport Canada, IRCC, and Defence. I want to confirm that we will continue this important discussion.
4:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
The order of the House under which we are now operating was to hear one briefing. I believe Ms. Sidhu's suggestion is that we extend the briefings into next week. She has proposed a number of witnesses and certainly invited the opposition to submit witnesses as well, with the understanding that the clerk will make whatever arrangements can be made to bring them together for the meeting. Is it the will of the committee to proceed in this way?
4:30 p.m.
Some hon. members
Agreed.
4:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Okay, it shall be done.
Today before us we have Mr. Stephen Lucas, deputy minister. From the Public Health Agency of Canada we have Tina Namiesniowski, president, and Dr. Theresa Tam, chief public health officer.
Welcome, everyone.
I believe the deputy minister does not have a statement, but the Public Health Agency has a seven-minute statement.
Please proceed.
4:30 p.m.
Tina Namiesniowski President, Public Health Agency of Canada
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you for the opportunity to address the Standing Committee on Health regarding the Public Health Agency of Canada's efforts to prepare for and respond to the arrival of novel coronavirus in Canada.
l'm here today with Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada's chief public health officer, and Dr. Stephen Lucas, deputy minister for Health Canada.
Currently, our objective is confinement, to limit the impact and spread of the virus. That includes detecting and treating existing cases effectively and managing disinformation in order to reduce fear.
Federal, provincial and municipal approaches must be uniform. Collaboration is imperative.
To this point, the response to cases of the virus in Canada shows a high level of intergovernmental coordination. This means that the system is working as expected.
Mr. Chair, we have learned a lot, not only from SARS, but also from the H1N1 pandemic and, most recently, the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo. There have been key improvements made in Canada with respect to our capacity to respond to these types of situations.
We've had the creation of the Public Health Agency of Canada, to provide clear leadership federally during a response. We have enhanced federal-provincial-territorial collaboration through a formal network of public health experts led by Dr. Tam, which is called the Public Health Network Council. We also have a chief public health officer, whose role was born out of the SARS experience, to ensure an authoritative voice to all Canadians during a public health event, which is essential.
As I think everybody knows, the situation is evolving in Canada, as it is around the world. Since the initial identification of a cluster of cases in Wuhan, China, in late December, there are now over 6,000 confirmed cases of the new coronavirus in 31 provinces in China, including 133 deaths. Ninety-nine per cent of the cases are in China, with the majority in Wuhan.
Closer to home, within the United States there are five confirmed cases, and in Canada three—two in Ontario and one in British Columbia. We expect that the number of confirmed cases in China and other countries will continue to rise as monitoring efforts continue to increase and more individuals present themselves to health providers with symptoms and are diagnosed.
It's not unexpected for us to have travel-related cases in Canada. The health system has been on alert since we first heard of the outbreak in China at the end of December, and it has remained vigilant to detect potential cases and to respond as quickly as possible as soon as they are recognized.
Where are we focusing our efforts, from a federal perspective? In terms of border measures, at the three airports that accept direct flights from China—Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal—we now have information on screens in the customs hall, in French, English and simplified Chinese, which tells individuals to self-identify to a border services agent if they are experiencing the novel coronavirus symptoms.
We have a health screening question that has been added to the electronic kiosks at all three of those airports, which asks travellers if they have been to Wuhan. As of today, this question will reference the whole of Hubei province. By the end of week, we will have more public health staff deployed in airports to complement CBSA screening in customs halls and to provide information about what individuals should do if they experience any symptoms.
We have been working very hard to mobilize the public health system across the country. The Public Health Agency is regularly convening provincial counterparts to share information and diagnostic capacity and to develop guidance for our health response, under the leadership of Dr. Tam. We've had significant engagement with provinces and territories, since at the end of the day they are the front-line response that's very much involved in dealing with cases on the ground.
We now have a federal-provincial-territorial special advisory committee that's been struck, focused exclusively on the novel coronavirus. The Minister of Health is also engaging with her PT counterparts to discuss collective readiness and encourage collaboration. Of course, we're working very closely with international partners, including the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control in the United States.
In terms of monitoring and reporting, monitoring illness due to the novel coronavirus is essential to containing its spread. We are working closely with provinces and territories and the World Health Organization to track the spread of this virus. Our National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg has the test for the novel virus and is working collaboratively with provinces and territories to increase testing capacity across the country.
Our lab in Winnipeg is also our reference lab, which is confirming provincial and territorial test results, given that this is a new virus. Canada of course is obligated under the international health regulations to report confirmed cases of coronavirus to the World Health Organization.
After a case is confirmed, the focus shifts to contact tracing to determine if others have been infected. Contact tracing is led by local public health authorities, in collaboration with provincial and federal agencies such as federal border and quarantine services, airlines and public health agencies in other countries. The cases in Ontario and British Columbia were managed using appropriate infection protection and control measures.
In terms of research and vaccines, we have been working internationally in contributing to the mobilization of an international response. Through Global Affairs investments, Canada is funding a global alliance, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, which is coordinating early international efforts for vaccine development. Also, we are working with existing partners to pursue research studies to characterize the virus, develop animal models and explore candidate vaccines that can contribute to international vaccine development efforts.
There must be a proactive approach to communications. We must reassure Canadians by providing them with regular and transparent updates in order to combat disinformation on the matter. This is a vital lesson we learned from our experience with SARS, when a situation arose in which some Chinese communities and individuals were the victims of racism and racial profiling. We must confront that problem from the outset. Many of our efforts are focused on countermeasures to messages that may be spread through social media.
Dr. Tam and her colleague, the deputy chief public health officer of Canada Dr. Howard Njoo, are also engaging regularly with the media through technical updates.
As well, we are providing advice to Canadian travellers, through travel.gc.ca, to help them make informed choices about travelling to China and elsewhere: to help reduce the risk of getting sick, and the steps to take if they exhibit symptoms associated with coronavirus. We also now have a 1-800 line that Canadians can call to get information about the coronavirus.
Dr. Tam is also undertaking outreach to national health professional organizations. There is regular communication with federal workers and federally regulated employers with information on occupational health and safety in terms of this particular virus.
As I mentioned, we have a coronavirus information line that's now live for Canadians, which provides answers to specific questions. We've been engaging with other stakeholders, such as air carriers, to ensure that they understand their role, pursuant to the Quarantine Act, about notifying us in the event that they have a sick traveller on their conveyance prior to their arrival in Canada, so that we are able to deal with that effectively once the person touches down and breaches our shores. Of course, they are interested as well in the protection of their own staff.
Finally, I would like to thank the Standing Committee on Health for taking the time to examine the coronavirus situation. We are actively monitoring its appearance and continuously assessing the risk it poses for Canadians. At the same time, we are actively working to contain the virus in order to limit its spread.
As I noted already, we have been working very hard with our partners, and we will continue to do that on the way forward.
Mr. Chair, we would be very pleased to answer your questions.
Thank you.
4:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you, Ms. Namiesniowski.
The first question goes to the Conservatives.
4:40 p.m.
Liberal
Marcus Powlowski Liberal Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON
On a point of order, I'm not sure whom to ask what question. It would make sense to ask each witness a bunch of questions, because I don't think we're going to have time. I think we want to ask questions of all of them. Given the limited time, would it make more sense to let everyone speak and then get our questions in? I just want to get questions in.
4:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
The procedure is that everybody gets a time slot. You have six minutes and you address those questions to whomever you like. The witnesses have 10 minutes per organization to give a presentation.
I erroneously said seven but I gave you 10.
Mr. Lucas is not presenting. We've heard from the witnesses, and now we will have questions, starting with Mr. Jeneroux.
January 29th, 2020 / 4:40 p.m.
Conservative
Matt Jeneroux Conservative Edmonton Riverbend, AB
First, there's just a quick procedural thing, to answer my friend Mr. Powlowski. The unanimous consent motion that was passed in the House doesn't have an end time. I recognize that the agenda today does, and that's 5:30. However, there is no end time and the unanimous consent motion supersedes the agenda. We'll proceed under that, and hopefully everybody will be able to have enough time to ask and answer their questions.
The Prime Minister said today, with regard to the first flight that came in from China, that there were a number of individuals they were trying to follow up with and contact. The purpose of the official opposition in calling this committee was to make sure that Canadians have as much information as possible. I feel that the public safety of Canadians is of the utmost importance to everybody within the House of Commons. When he made those comments today, I think probably some flags were raised across the country with regard to the percentage of the people we've been able to contact and where those people are.
I am hoping that you can shed some light on how many people were on that flight to begin with and how many people we have been able to follow up with since that flight.
4:45 p.m.
President, Public Health Agency of Canada
Pursuant to the comment I made during my opening statement, contact tracing is something that falls within the responsibility of the local provincial health authority within the jurisdiction that has the individual they're dealing with.
That said, we've been working very hard with the Province of Ontario to support its efforts in terms of identifying individuals who were on the plane associated with the first index case in Canada.
At this point, it's our understanding that if they haven't contacted 100% of the people who were in the surrounding area of that index case, it's about 99.9%. Unless my colleague the deputy minister from Health Canada has anything to add to that, that's our understanding at this point in time.