Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to the witnesses for coming today.
Ms. Kiddell-Monroe, while you and I may disagree on some aspects of this, I definitely appreciate the passion that you have for the issue. It's clear that you have a tremendous passion. And around this table--and from what Mr. Garneau said as well--if the question is do we want to help the people of Africa who are suffering, absolutely, I think that you'd find agreement all around the table and in this room. The question we're trying to answer today is does Bill C-393 actually accomplish this, or are there other things that are working or that we should be focusing on to accomplish this?
I go back to Mr. Kilby's testimony before the committee here the other day, when he was talking about the numbers of people who are receiving antiretroviral drugs. He talked about the numbers in 2003 and he said that 400,000 were receiving those drugs; by 2005 we got up to 1.5 million; and by the end of 2010 we expect to get to 5.2 million people being treated. That seems like a significant number. In fact Mr. Kilby, to quote him from the meeting, said:
Essentially a comprehensive model for care many believed could never be built emerged in a few short years. What has been accomplished is nothing short of a miracle, 5.2 million people on treatment by 2010.
Do you agree with what Mr. Kilby had to say regarding the progress?