Evidence of meeting #26 for Health in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was covid19.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Sonia Sidhu Liberal Brampton South, ON
Thank you, Dr. Arts.
Dr. Falcone, we all know that long COVID-19 has a long impact on some chronic diseases. What kinds of impacts do you feel there are or you see on such chronic diseases as diabetes or mental health, but especially mental health? How has it gotten worse? How is long COVID impacting those populations?
Director, Post-COVID-19 Research Clinic, Montreal Clinical Research Institute, Attending Physician, Infectious Diseases, Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, As an Individual
Well, for one, both of the chronic illnesses you mentioned are risk factors for long COVID. For those who get long COVID and who have these pre-existing chronic illnesses, we can see exacerbations. For diabetes you could see an exacerbation in the acute phase, and there could be issues with glucose management more long term. With mental illness, we certainly see a worsening of symptoms. Of course, this is multifactorial, but certainly there's an impact from just not being able to recover. People find it very discouraging. When you compound that with issues of sleep, for example, all of those are ingredients for deterioration in pre-existing mental illness.
Liberal
Sonia Sidhu Liberal Brampton South, ON
Thank you.
COVID-19 has highlighted new and existing issues that make it a challenge to collect, access and share health data for the benefit and use of Canadians. I know that in the mandate letter of the Minister of Health he was tasked with working with the provinces and territories to create a “world-class health data system” for Canada.
Would you have any recommendations with regard to the development of a pan-Canadian health data strategy to improve Canada's health care data system?
Director, Post-COVID-19 Research Clinic, Montreal Clinical Research Institute, Attending Physician, Infectious Diseases, Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, As an Individual
I think that, certainly, such an infrastructure could definitely be beneficial.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
We can't hear you, Dr. Falcone. I don't know if....
Dr. Falcone, I don't think it's on your end. I think it might be on ours.
Can you try it now, Dr. Falcone? That's perfect.
Go ahead with a brief answer, if you could.
Director, Post-COVID-19 Research Clinic, Montreal Clinical Research Institute, Attending Physician, Infectious Diseases, Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, As an Individual
I think, briefly, one way that would ensure the success of such a mandate would be to have a committee that includes representatives from all of the provinces and territories, and in different disciplines, so we could come together and come up with protocols and infrastructures that are consistent and coherent across the country.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you, Ms. Sidhu and Dr. Falcone.
Next we're going to go back to Ms. Goodridge, please, for five minutes.
Conservative
Laila Goodridge Conservative Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to all of the witnesses for all of the work you've done. I think it's really important.
I just do want to apologize, I know that you have worked very hard on this. I was moving a motion as is the prerogative of this committee and sometimes that's what happens.
I specifically want to ask some questions of Dr. O'Brien.
I think the way you laid out the six lessons for COVID-19 really made sense in my head, and I was just wondering if you could simplify any further, or if you had any points that you think are truly important for policy-makers in this country to bring forward as we go through as COVID goes on.
Associate Professor, Department of Physical Therapy, and Co-Director, Rehabilitation Science Research Network for COVID, University of Toronto, As an Individual
I think recognizing the role for rehabilitation first and foremost in the context of long COVID is important, and then, secondly, ensuring access to rehabilitation services for those living with long COVID and ensuring that the access is equitable.
I think we're all on a learning curve, and speaking from my profession of physiotherapy, this is a time where we are growing and learning as the evidence emerges. For example, rehabilitation is not just exercise and does not just have to do with physical activity, and we're learning that depending on the path of physiology of long COVID—
Conservative
Laila Goodridge Conservative Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB
Just hold on one quick second because we're not hearing you in the room and I'm not sure—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
We're having the same technical problem we're have with Dr. Falcone.
We're hearing you in the room but only through the earpieces and not in the speakers in the room, so it's on our end and not yours, so bear with us please.
Professor, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Western Ontario, As an Individual
I just wanted to ask Ms. Goulding a quick question.
Would you mind, if you're interested, send me an email address because we are trying to engage some patient advocacy groups, and I'd really appreciate that.
Founder, COVID Long-Haulers Support Group Canada
Yes, absolutely, my pleasure.
Professor, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Western Ontario, As an Individual
Thank you.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Ms. Goulding, you should be aware that we are in public right now so you may want to do that privately unless you want everyone who is watching the webcast to get the answer to that question.
Conservative
Laila Goodridge Conservative Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB
Ms. Goulding, I would highly recommend that you not share your email address.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Ms. Goodridge, we're still having the technical difficulties.
We're going to suspend for three minutes to see if we can get this resolved.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
I call the meeting back to order.
Colleagues around the table, if you're having any trouble hearing the witnesses, if you plug in your earpiece, you will be able to get them through your earpiece.
When we left off, Ms. Goodridge was just starting her turn.
Ms. Goodridge, you have the floor.
Conservative
Laila Goodridge Conservative Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to the witnesses.
I think that very brief informal conversation we had with Mr. Arts and Ms. Goulding goes to show how little information is, in fact, out there on the COVID long-haulers and some of that idea.
Ms. Goulding, I think you have spoken extremely eloquently thus far even though you've apologized a few times for having words escape you. From my perspective, you've done an exceptionally good job at explaining this, and I am wondering if there's anything else you want to leave with us as a committee to consider as we go forward with this. We will be forming some recommendations at some point when this committee wraps up this study, and I think your perspective, since you are someone with lived experience, is extremely valuable.
Founder, COVID Long-Haulers Support Group Canada
Thank you so much.
I think what's really important to remember is that we're all Canadians. We all need support together. We need to support one another. As we said at the beginning of the pandemic, no Canadian will be left behind. I think we need to honour that and address the issue of people suffering with long COVID and really support their needs financially, with respect to getting access to care and definitely by trying to get to the bottom to figure out the underlying mechanisms of what's causing this disease and these terrible symptoms that people are dealing with. People really are losing their lives. It's quite a serious issue, and what's terrifying is that it's so unknown to such a large percentage of the population that this could possibly be an outcome of having COVID. People really need to protect themselves.
I think messaging is really important with public health to help people understand what we're going through, to deal with our situations with compassion and to really want to help one another to get through this situation. There is strength in numbers, and we are only going to get through this together. Fantastic outcomes can come from new discoveries with respect to chronic illnesses that people have been suffering from for years on end in other communities because there are many aspects that are overlapping with other illnesses in different communities. This research could be game-changing for millions of people. Funding for clinical research is important as is support for long-haulers so they can live and recover and get back to being productive citizens of society. We all just want to get back to work. We want to enjoy the things in life that we used to enjoy. We want to have relationships with our families and live a meaningful life and just recover and be believed and supported.
Thank you.
Conservative
Laila Goodridge Conservative Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB
Thank you, Ms. Goulding. I believe that's my time.
Liberal
Liberal
Marcus Powlowski Liberal Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON
I'd like to ask all the doctors, either Ph.D.'s or medical doctors, something.
Drs. Falcone, O'Brien and Arts, you all mentioned the incidence as being somewhere in the neighbourhood of 10% to 30%. I'm pretty sure you've all had the same experience as I have, which is that when it comes to COVID, the world is a little bit different. Not only do we read the papers, but we also know a lot of people who've had COVID.
I'm a doctor too. I know we're not supposed to listen to anecdotal evidence. But my anecdotal evidence is, like Dr. Hanley's, that the majority of people I know have had COVID. All of my employees on Parliament Hill have had COVID. My family have all had COVID. Most of the people I know have had COVID. Yet to my knowledge, none of them complain of long-term symptoms.
Doesn't that 10% to 30% seem a little bit high to you, and isn't part of the problem that with rapid testing having supplanted PCRs, we really don't know what percentage of people have had COVID? Again, the question is, do you really think it's as high as 10% to 30%?