The Canadian Armed Forces are working very closely with the Public Health Agency and other federal government partners as part of the COVID-19 vaccine task force. We have already committed Canadian Armed Forces members and leaders as part of this effort.
Currently, we have a number of CAF members operating out of the Public Health Agency to establish what will be known as a “national operation centre”, which will be the command and control node, or the hub that will coordinate the distribution of a COVID-19 vaccine across the country, including in northern and remote communities. Our chief of the defence staff has dispatched some of his best planners to work with the Public Health Agency to develop a logistic support plan that will, for all intents and purposes, be the manoeuvre plan to support the delivery of the vaccine across the country.
Beyond that, I believe the Minister of Health and the president of the Public Health Agency will be coming forward in short order with an update on the status of the logistic support plan, the distribution plan that's going to be put in place. In terms of the Canadian Armed Forces' role in that, we will continue to collaborate with the Public Health Agency to better understand what the needs of the CAF might be, and our chief of the defence staff will provide advice to the minister.
To address your specific point on support for northern and remote communities, our chief of the defence staff has made it clear that throughout this pandemic, we're to be prepared to provide support to those communities when called upon.