Thank you for the question.
You must understand that, for a long time in Canada, public vaccine manufacturing capacity was very high. There's a significant difference between public and private production capacity. In the case of public production capacity, the public authorities decide on the priorities for the use of its facilities. There's a great deal of talk here about intellectual property. There's a serious general issue when it comes to this matter. Intellectual property incentives don't always align with public health needs. Additional tools are needed to make the necessary products when intellectual property incentives aren't sufficient.
For a long time, there was Connaught Laboratories in Toronto. In Canada, this company was the hub of vaccine manufacturing. There was also the Institut Armand-Frappier, in the Quebec City area. Connaught Laboratories was sold to Sanofi. In terms of the Institut Armand-Frappier, there was a public-private partnership, which became IAF-Biochem Pharma. This company was subsequently sold to the Shire multinational company. Shire sold the parts end to end. The vaccine manufacturing facilities became the property of GlaxoSmithKline. The facilities still exist, but private companies now decide how they're used. The companies do so based on the priorities of their shareholders, not public health priorities.
When the Institut Armand-Frappier was privatized, the argument was simple: the public sector shouldn't step on the toes of private enterprise, against which there shouldn't be any unfair competition. However, this involved much-needed production capacity. More public production capacity is needed. Now, a type of comeback has been announced. The government announced $126 million for the National Research Council of Canada. However, a public-private investment of half a billion dollars has just been announced for Sanofi, which owns the Connaught Laboratories facility in Toronto. This agreement is still confidential and it isn't yet clear who can decide on the priorities for the use of these facilities. In my opinion, this situation is extremely troublesome.
I'll give you the example of another pandemic, the Ebola virus. Canada developed the Ebola vaccine in the public sector. Canada then did what it always does. It sold the licence to a private firm so that the firm could manufacture the vaccine. This firm did nothing for 10 years. It wasn't until the latest Ebola outbreak that suddenly panic arose. The licence was simply sold back to Merck so that Merck could make the vaccine.
Many people were very upset that a small company would purchase a public licence at a low price and sell it to a large company at a very high price. I, for one, was outraged that it took the deaths of 10,000 Ebola victims to get this vaccine, which we had developed ourselves, made. That's unacceptable. In these situations, the financial incentives for intellectual property don't meet the overall public health needs.