Thank you very much for the question. I want to assure the member that this issue is one that my colleague the Minister of Health would probably be best to address, so the committee should probably invite her to come and join you.
We have been very supportive of the provinces during this pandemic to help address the increased costs. We gave over half a billion dollars to provinces and territories, at the very beginning of this, to assist them with the health care costs and to help them get ready to address the rising costs and the changes they would need to do in order to get the health care system ready for the pandemic. As I mentioned before, we put $2 billion on the table for protective equipment for essential workers, including those on the front lines in health care. We also provided $3 billion to the provinces and territories to help them with wage subsidies for those front-line workers, especially long-term care workers who needed to be properly compensated for working in the environment they're working in.
We've been putting a tremendous amount of money on the table to support the provinces and territories in the health sector. We'll continue to be there for the provinces and territories. You heard the Prime Minister. We're there with our military, actually going in and supporting 25 long-term care centres with people—