Absolutely, Mr. Cannings.
When you think back to the chamber in which some of you are sitting, you may remember that it was Monsieur Lalonde, I believe, in the early 1970s, who really introduced the health of the population to Canadians. That really means not only an illness care system for when people are sick, but recognizing that education, housing, food security, eradication of poverty, and good drinking water are incredibly important components of health. Of course, for illness care it means strong delivery mechanisms.
We know currently that one of the greatest challenges facing our health care system is adequate health human resources. That challenge is not unique to Canada; it is around the world. When we think about the economics of health care, we realize it is one of the most expensive social programs, yet of course one of the most important, although I am a tiny bit biased.
That said, if we really want to look at the effectiveness of the system, often we need to look at the incentives that we've put within it.
I could think of a moonshot looking at the sustainability of a health care system, but would it include economists thinking about how we can better fund the system and better align our incentives to the outcomes that we're hoping for? Would it include thinking about data scientists and artificial intelligence experts who can help Canadians make better individual decisions? Would it include thinking about digital health that allows people with chronic diseases like congestive heart failure or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease to be able to be managed at home using downloadable, wearable devices, which are actually made right here in Canada by remarkable companies that are actually often more attractive on the international market than on our own Canadian market?
Last, but certainly not least, who are the extenders of physicians and nurses and therapists who we know could and should be brought to the health care system to make that health human resource issue get much better? We could easily think about a science-social, science-economics model of care by which we would bring together truly the most interdisciplinary team we could imagine to address both population health and the health care system of those who are ill and require treatment.