In an ideal world, we would be in a position to begin new appointments to the appellate body and would have a legitimate appeal mechanism by which WHO members could seek to appeal panel decisions.
Because the United States has been blocking appointments since 2017, that appellate body can no longer hear disputes. Because of the potential impact of that for Canada, in terms of disputes that we have ongoing right now but also disputes that we might launch in the future, it has been very important that we put in place some form of interim arrangement, or arrangements, by which we can ensure we have some form of appeal mechanism. That was the reason Canada sought a bilateral arrangement with the European Union this past summer, and why, on the basis of that, we are now engaged in discussions with 16 other WHO members to do something on a multi-party basis.
That is intended as a temporary solution until such a time as the appellate body is functional again.