Thank you very much. I would like to ask my first questions of Mr. Possamai.
I really appreciated your explanation of the lack of urgency. I can tell you that having been on this committee from the very beginning, I felt that very same lack of urgency coming from PHAC and from the government on a number of these things.
We had very serious concerns about the messaging from Dr. Tam regarding the danger that mask use would pose to Canadians and her insistence on ignoring the precautionary principle. This messaging, obviously, was subsequently repeated by Minister Hajdu at many of the COVID-19 briefings, and now, since then, there is new science that made them change their recommendation. Unfortunately, this meant that we lost a very important window of opportunity to get Canadians on board and comfortable with mask use.
From the various presentations we've had at this committee, it appears that Canadians were possibly being told not to wear a mask at the beginning because PHAC knew our national stockpile had not been maintained and there were not enough masks in Canada to protect even just our health care workers.
Would you say that the politicization at the highest level of PHAC has affected the decisions being made, to the detriment of Canadians?