Evidence of meeting #19 for Health in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was vaccines.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Okay.
Two days ago, on February 17, the Public Health Agency of Canada confirmed it is monitoring reports of two variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, first thought to have originated in the U.K. and California, combining to make one heavily mutated hybrid. Could you outline the potential risks posed by such a recombinant virus?
Acting Scientific Director General, National Microbiology Laboratory, Public Health Agency of Canada
We are still monitoring that particular variant and learning more about its biology. It is not clear at this time whether this represents a true recombination event or further variants of an existing variant of concern. We are closely monitoring the science to understand its potential impact.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
That ends round one. We start round two with Mr. Barlow, I believe.
Mr. Barlow, please go ahead for five minutes.
Conservative
John Barlow Conservative Foothills, AB
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I'm going to start with Dr. Quach-Thanh. In your presentation, you said that the vaccines we currently have approved are effective against the variants that we are aware of. However, on the NACI website, it says that there is no evidence that two doses of the approved vaccines have any effectiveness on the variants.
Can you clarify that? Are the vaccines that we have approved currently effective against the variants, yes or no?
Chair and Professor, Université de Montréal, National Advisory Committee on Immunization
What I've said is that the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, based on the studies that have been emerging after the statement, seem to be efficacious against the B.1.1.7. We don't have much data about the South African strain variant yet. Against the U.K. variant, it seems to be fine. Against the South African variant, it seems it still remains to be looked at.
Conservative
John Barlow Conservative Foothills, AB
Thank you for answering that, but that is different from the statement, and even reading the language in the statement.... That's not what's said there, so I would encourage you to clarify that. I'm glad you did on that question.
Dr. Poliquin, you stated during your presentation that you are now putting together a team of representatives from PHAC, virologists and epidemiologists, to look at a strategy to address the variants. I would think every expert would have known that the COVID-19 virus was going to mutate and that dealing with variants was going to be a problem, which is one of the reasons we're here.
I'm a little shocked that we're a year into this and that this has only happened now. Why is this team only being put together now to deal with variants when this is something that I think should have been addressed much earlier?
Acting Scientific Director General, National Microbiology Laboratory, Public Health Agency of Canada
On the issue of getting ready for variants, Canada began its work to be ready for the detection and the characterization of variants in April 2020 through the investment of $40 million into the CanCOGeN initiative. Through that work, we were able to study the early rise of variants of concern, including the emergence in the summer of the D.614G variant, and provide characterization.
What we're doing now is building on that foundation of success and further expanding our ability to sequence, to study and to understand the spread of these variants through a combined, robust surveillance program, including laboratory and epidemiology resources, matched to a strong research arm, and that is able to swiftly work on a common research agenda to deliver information in as close to real time as possible to decision-makers to inform further policy.
Conservative
John Barlow Conservative Foothills, AB
Thank you very much.
Maybe to Dr. Poliquin again, I was really concerned with some of the questions that my colleague was asking at the beginning...none of these assumptions, the impact of rapid tests or new vaccines, have had on this modelling that was done....
Do you think it's irresponsible to release these models to the Canadian public without including those assumptions as part of the process, at least to MPs and the media? Do you not think this is irresponsible?
Acting Scientific Director General, National Microbiology Laboratory, Public Health Agency of Canada
Mr. Chair, the models that are presented represent an ongoing refinement of our understanding of SARS-CoV-2 as the science continues to evolve and as we learn more about a number of parameters, including transmission, reproduction number and vaccine efficacy. These models are updated and are presented.
The assumptions are available and are made available to researchers and to those who are interested, recognizing—
Conservative
John Barlow Conservative Foothills, AB
I'm sorry, Mr. Poliquin. I only have a certain amount of time. I appreciate that, but Canadians are stressed. Businesses are closing, people are losing their jobs, and to have this information available only to researchers, I think, is irresponsible. This information should be available to every Canadian, and it should have been released with the modelling as background to where you're getting this information, to the media and MPs here at this meeting, which you knew was going to be happening.
Maybe Dr. Quach, you can answer this for me, please, or maybe Dr. Poliquin can. Another major concern with Canadians that I know all of us are getting is the mandatory quarantine at hotels when returning home. Is there any data that backs up the fact that quarantining in these hotels rather than at home is reducing the spread of the variant in any way?
Chair and Professor, Université de Montréal, National Advisory Committee on Immunization
I'll defer that to someone else because this is really out of NACI's mandate. I'm sorry.
Acting Scientific Director General, National Microbiology Laboratory, Public Health Agency of Canada
What we are continuing to do with respect to understanding the spread of variants is to continue to update our suite of public health—
Conservative
John Barlow Conservative Foothills, AB
As of right now, you don't have any data that proves that staying quarantined in a hotel reduces the spread of the virus?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you, Mr. Barlow. We'll let the witness answer and then we'll carry on.
Go ahead.
Acting Scientific Director General, National Microbiology Laboratory, Public Health Agency of Canada
At this time, we are continuing to update and monitor the impact of a suite of public health measures, including our border policy, on the impact on the spread of variants and the introduction of variants of concern into Canada.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ron McKinnon
Thank you.
We'll go now to Mr. Fisher.
Please, go ahead for five minutes.
Liberal
Darren Fisher Liberal Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
As usual, thank you to all of the witnesses who are here today. I'm sorry we're a little bit late.
My first question would be to PHAC. We're seeing vaccine deliveries ramp up very quickly here. They are quadrupling this week and they're going to continue to rise substantially in the weeks to come. We know that the provinces and the territories have the delivery of health care and they're responsible for getting the vaccines in the arms of Canadians.
I'm quite fascinated by just how complex this procedure must be. Could you could speak to the coordinating of our vaccine rollout with the provinces and territories and just exactly what something like that looks like. As we ramp up, we're going to have to have mass vaccination sites set up. Is this something that your organization plays a role in at PHAC?
Senior Vice-President, Immunization Program, Public Health Agency of Canada
From the perspective of undertaking an immunization campaign this large and complex, I know that everybody in this room knows that this is unprecedented for us. What isn't unprecedented is the fact that we work really hard with provinces and territories and with public health officials across the country every day on preparedness and on execution.
When it comes to this operation, we have set up a national operations centre that is running the logistics for distribution and is on top of vaccine deliveries 24-7. We have a committee of federal, provincial and territorial officials, and those people are on-the-ground program immunization deliverers who are talking twice a week, if not more, about the things that they are seeing on the ground so that we can, at the federal level, support immunization program delivery.
How do we do that? We do that by, for instance, ensuring that those programs have the types of syringes that they need to immunize Canadians. When Pfizer went to a six-dose vial from a five-dose vial, we provided, at the federal level, the syringes that provinces and territories required to be able to get that sixth dose. We are also working with them every step of the way to look at issues of effectiveness and safety.
That's another important part of the rollout of an immunization campaign. It's not just getting the needle into people's arms, it's also doing surveillance after they've been vaccinated to see what the effect of vaccination is. That involves us using, for instance, vaccine registries that are in provinces and territories and that we have provided additional support to so that we're getting good data, and provinces and territories themselves are able to monitor what's going on in their jurisdictions.
From all of those various pieces of, I'll call them, infrastructure and machinery...both are things that have been in place for a very long time. As Dr. Quach stated, every year we roll out 12 to 15 million influenza shots across the country. Provinces and territories deliver those in clinics, in doctors' offices and in pharmacies, so we're obviously very well prepared for this kind of venture, which is more complex.
We've beefed up everything so that we are able to be much more consistent in our execution and we've practised. We've had proof-of-concept demonstrations with our colleagues at round tables doing tabletop exercises and doing the kinds of things that one would do in terms of challenging each other on the what-ifs. What if this happens? How are we going to handle it? All of these things are part of the preparedness that we undertake with all jurisdictions on a regular basis.
Liberal
Darren Fisher Liberal Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS
Moving over to the NACI folks, as you know, we have the team Canada approach here in Canada. Is this something that your group plays a part in as well in working out logistics and how we're going to ramp up?
Do you have a role? Do your guidelines speak to that as well?
Chair and Professor, Université de Montréal, National Advisory Committee on Immunization
Not at all. We are not part of the rollout. It's the Canadian immunization committee with the provinces and territories.
Liberal
Darren Fisher Liberal Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS
Okay. There's no NACI component to when you have to ramp up when numbers of vaccines quadruple or increase massively over the next few weeks.
Chair and Professor, Université de Montréal, National Advisory Committee on Immunization