Thank you so very much.
Overnight, it became a primary source of information about breast implants.
Let me give you some examples to illustrate the importance of a breast implant registry.
On March 4, 2019, an article in La Presse reported that 15,000 women with textured implants in Quebec would be contacted by the authorities. However, four years later, most of them were never contacted. Many are breast cancer survivors who have undergone post-mastectomy reconstruction with textured implants. These women have never been contacted by the public health facility where they underwent their reconstruction and learned about it on an informal platform run by women who have also been negatively affected by breast implants.
A few surgeons took the initiative to contact their patients to offer to meet and discuss with them the impacts of textured implants on their health. In Quebec, Dr. Stephen Nicolaidis is one of them. This example raises an extremely important point in creating an implant registry: the mandatory legal retention period for patients' medical records and the responsibility for information sharing.
In Quebec, thousands of patients who have had breast implants are unable to find information about their surgery or their implants because of the 5-year retention period for medical records. In comparison, British Columbia has a retention period of 16 years. A chart illustrating the mandatory retention periods for medical records for each province in Canada is appended.
Another example is the recall of breast implants from the manufacturer Mentor in 2022 by Health Canada, which was ignored and never publicly reported. Discovered by chance, this recall was posted on a Facebook group page. Women came forward, outraged to learn that they had problematic implants, and had it not been for the vigilance of the members of the group, the news would never have been released. A registry would have alerted these patients, just as it would have alerted women with Biocell implants in Canada and the United States sooner than 2019. Let's not forget that the ANSM in France issued a recall in December 2018 for these same implants, and that a registry was set up in 2019.
A national registry of implants would alleviate these problems. Right now, it is us, the patients, who are working to ensure that members of support groups on social media have the correct, scientific and official information. We are the ones who translate the most recent English-language, mostly American, press releases for the benefit of francophone women.
You must realize, dear committee members, that our platforms have literally served as a registry for our members since 2018 and that they do the work that the government and public health agencies are not doing.
However, these women have to find us. It is an absolutely abnormal situation that puts us in the crosshairs of doctors and surgeons, and we are constantly subjected to their condescension, both in person and on social media. Keep these situations in mind and don't forget the effort expended by workers and patients in terms of time and energy and travel. And it must also not be forgotten that they do all this strictly on a volunteer basis.
Do we really need to remind people that public health agencies are responsible for the safety and approval of health products, and warnings about them? The only possible way to provide all participants with the same information at the same time is a computer database for the mandatory declaration of implanting a high-risk medical product that links the public health agency, the manufacturer, the purchasers in hospitals and in private practice, and the patients. A registry like this would be part of the safety and warning system for medical implants. It should be an integral part of the process of accepting a health product and it goes hand in hand with the precautionary principle.
In Canada, the main manufacturers of breast implants are Allergan and Mentor. No matter where these implants are licensed, distributed or sold, they are all manufactured using the same formula, the same ingredients, the same process and the same facilities—only the delivery points differ. Mentor implants come from California and the Netherlands, Allergan implants come mainly from Costa Rica, and formerly from Ireland. They are distributed worldwide. A partial list of compounds and ingredients is appended.
If a manufacturer experiences problems—let's cite the example of Allergan's Biocell implants, which account for 85% of worldwide cases of breast implant-associated anaplastic large cell lymphoma, known as BIA-ALCL; in other words, all countries where the implants have been distributed are affected. It is therefore only logical to believe that if a health agency decides to warn a manufacturer, proceed with a recall or ban a product for safety reasons, the agencies of all the countries where this product is distributed should automatically issue the same warning at the same time.
Despite the borders, the same implants are going into human bodies. And these humans have the right to receive this information immediately and at the same time. In the same way that car manufacturers immediately contact all dealers selling their vehicles when there is a problem or a recall, with only a few days between the moment an automobile problem is identified by the manufacturer and the moment when my dealer contacts me to fix the problem. This is done at their expense, for my safety and their reputation. In Canada, the law requires it, whether the problem is minor or major.
Only a breast implant registry can treat us as well as the vehicles we drive.
Thank you and I am now tabling these documents for the committee.
