Science and Research Committee on Feb. 17th, 2022

[Dr. Shannon Quinn]

No, this was a greenfield facility, so it was started from scratch. The facility itself was constructed in just under a year, which is very quick. Part of the reason that's possible is that it was on land that the NRC already owned. It took advantage of the expertise that already existed in our health laboratories.

I want to clarify. The first phase is constructing the facility, which is complete. Then there are multiple licences that are required from Health Canada in order to actually produce a vaccine. Work is well under way towards good manufacturing practice certification, which ultimately leads to the required licensing of the facility. The specific vaccine also needs to be licensed, and then there's a licence for the vaccine in the facility. Work is under way towards all of that.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Very quickly—I know I'm literally on borrowed time here—is the goal to use your researchers to develop and manufacture vaccines there, or to partner up with private sector investors to do that?

[Dr. Shannon Quinn]

It's our facility, but the idea is that it would be partnering with others in order to produce their vaccines.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Thank you very much, Dr. Quinn.

Thank you Chair, for allowing me the opportunity.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you so much.

With that, I'm going to thank our tremendous witnesses. We are so grateful for your expertise.

The committee will suspend for two minutes while we sound check for our next panel.

Thank you all.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Colleagues, I bring our meeting back to order.

For the second panel, we have Genome Canada, Universities Canada and the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization.

We will hear five-minute statements, beginning with Genome Canada. We have Dr. Robert Annan, president and chief executive officer, and Pari Johnston, vice-president, policy and public affairs.

I will let the witnesses know that at the four and a half minute mark you will see a yellow card. You will have 30 seconds after that.

Welcome. We're delighted to have you, Dr. Annan.

[Dr. Robert Annan, President and Chief Executive Officer, Genome Canada]

Wonderful. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Good evening. I'm happy to be joining you tonight from Ottawa on the unceded traditional land of the Anishinabe Algonquin people.

Thank you for the invitation to participate in this historic study on the state of science in Canada.

First, I'd like to salute the leadership of Dr. Kirsty Duncan in the establishment of this important committee, and to thank all of you for your commitment to this important subject. I am very pleased to be here on behalf of Genome Canada, joined by my colleague Pari Johnston.

Genome Canada is a national, non-profit organization that was created 20 years ago in the shadow of the Human Genome Project. Canada was not a member of the international consortium that completed this historic moonshot achievement. This led a group of Canadian scientists to convince Parliament that Canada risked being left behind and missing the benefits of this exciting new research. They knew that investments in what was then cutting-edge science would be essential for Canada’s future. How right they were.

Genomics has since grown from a discovery science based on sequencing a single genome to a wide-ranging platform technology that has an impact across broad sectors of Canadian society. It drives innovation across precision health and agriculture and the development of novel therapeutics and cutting-edge approaches to forestry, energy and natural resources. We’ve built a national genomics ecosystem that includes six regional genome centres and works with university researchers, hospitals, government scientists and companies, many of which are in your ridings.

In the last 20 years, we've supported over $4 billion in applied research and innovation from coast to coast to coast, with more than half of that coming from private industry, provincial governments and other non-federal sources. We now have strong, world-class genomics researchers, trainees, companies and infrastructure that are leaders on the global stage. We at Genome Canada are deeply committed to a strong science system that will benefit Canada.

Science, especially the life sciences, stepped up in a big way during COVID. In April 2020, with the support of the federal government, Genome Canada launched CanCOGeN, a national network involving universities, public health labs, hospitals and private industry to build a national surveillance system to track viral transmission, the variants of concern and their impact on Canadians. This system has been a cornerstone of our national pandemic response, providing real-time information for public health decision-makers and contributing to a global understanding of the virus.

The Canadian genomics community responded quickly. It was a rapid response 20 years in the making, possible because visionary governments had made prior investments in capacity, talent and infrastructure that could be mobilized quickly to respond to this urgent, shared challenge.

As we emerge from this pandemic, there is no shortage of other urgent, shared challenges. There's climate change, food security, antimicrobial resistance and economic growth. Science can help drive solutions to these challenges, but we need to learn from our COVID experience, so that we have a science system that is up to the task.

What have we learned? First, we've learned that we have immense strengths. We have a diverse and distributed research system built on strong universities and colleges. Our researchers are world-class, and they train thoughtful, ambitious graduates. We have cutting-edge research infrastructure and strength in important technology platforms like genomics, AI and quantum. We also have a committed community of research and policy leaders with a diverse suite of programs to support the ecosystem.

However, we must also be honest about our challenges. Our system is fragmented and often misaligned, and we suffer from persistent coordination challenges in crucial areas like data sharing and research commercialization. We don't have a culture of policy innovation in the research and science space, which is in need of fresh, new approaches. We suffer from chronic underinvestment in R and D by the private sector. Perhaps most importantly, we do not have well-defined national strategic objectives for science.

Many of the ingredients for success are present, but we can't tackle the challenges separately or in isolation. We really need an ecosystem approach.

First, we need strong, stable investment in fundamental research and talent development. This is the base upon which everything rests.

Second, we need coordinated, system-wide approaches that can marshal this research strength into impact, for instance, through mission- or challenge-driven initiatives.

Third, we need strategic leadership to focus our efforts and resources. We need to be honest about where Canada can lead, where we must invest and where we can have the greatest impact. We think a lot about this at Genome Canada. We are seized with the opportunity of our current moment, the beginning of a biorevolution that will fundamentally transform our health, our economy and our environment.

Genome Canada employs a challenge-driven approach to harnessing this potential and ensuring that our capabilities in science generate positive impacts for Canadians. We know this approach will have a positive impact, and we know there are many other examples of great research happening in Canada.

As we come out of the pandemic, we in Canada have an opportunity to refresh our approach and re-energize our science and innovation ecosystem, ensuring that it will benefit all Canadians.

Thank you for your attention.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you so much, Dr. Annan. We really appreciate your comments.

We will now go to Universities Canada. We have Paul Davidson, president and chief executive officer, and Ann Mainville-Neeson, vice-president of policy and government relations.

You have five minutes. The floor is yours.

[Paul Davidson, President and Chief Executive Officer, Universities Canada]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

It's a great pleasure to be with you, with all members of the committee, and with colleague witnesses, with whom we work all the time. Thanks for the invitation to participate in this important study and for the extraordinary work that all parliamentarians are doing in this very challenging time.

With me today is Ann Mainville-Neeson, our vice-president of policy and government relations.

Universities Canada represents 96 universities across the country. Taken together, Canada's universities are a $38-billion enterprise. Universities employ more than 300,000 people, and are often the largest employer in their communities.

During the pandemic, Canada's universities have delivered. They've delivered on their educational mission by enabling 1.4 million learners to move online within days, offering hybrid instruction and returning to in-person instruction as soon as it's safe. Enrolment is up, retention is up and completion is up. There's a generation of graduates ready to put their shoulder to the wheel for Canada.

Universities have delivered on their research mission. Decades of discovery research at Canadian universities, including the work of UBC's Pieter Cullis, have been instrumental in creating vaccines and saving lives. Universities have delivered, both as stabilizers for communities across Canada beset by disruption and as catalysts for social and economic renewal.

This new standing committee is an exciting opportunity for Canada to take stock of the state of research capabilities and to build a broad consensus about the value of research.

It's worth highlighting how these capabilities have been built over the decades with the support of parliamentary champions. I'm thinking tonight of Peter Adams, who served as the member of Parliament for Peterborough for over a decade. While never in cabinet, he was the key driver behind the major research investments in the late 1990s and early 2000s that Rob Annan just spoke of. James Rajotte, the former member for Edmonton—Leduc, was a tireless supporter of the research community through the years of the Harper government. Bloc and NDP members have also made valuable contributions over the decades. Of course, I'm also thinking of the work of this committee's chair, Ms. Duncan, and her continued advocacy, first in opposition and later in government.

My hope for this committee is that it will model best practice in the world for non-partisan, evidence-based championing of science and research. Canada has world-class universities, research facilities, and talent, but we face steep global competition. We need your help. With science and research on the front page for the last two years, our allies and competitors are seizing the moment to massively reinvest in their research ecosystem.

Germany has committed to grow R and D investment to 3.5% of GDP by 2025. The United Kingdom's target is 2.4% of GDP. Its recent foreign policy framework puts sustaining advantages in science and technology as the first of four elements in its vision for global leadership—not as an appendix or an afterthought, but as the first pillar. In the United States, the National Science Foundation for the Future Act, which proposes doubling the budget of the NSF, received the support of all Democrats in the House and 134 Republicans. Political parties in Finland have reached a bipartisan agreement to raise R and D spending to 4% of GDP by 2030.

Canada needs comparable ambition. Currently, we rank 18th out of 37 OECD countries on these measures, spending only 1.5% of GDP on R and D. Last fall the Senate's prosperity action group proposed a target of 2.5% of GDP by 2030, or about the OECD average. I hope we can do better than that, but the first step is setting a target. The window of opportunity for this is now. The fundamental science review was published five years ago, and the associated investments are flattening out. Canadian research talent from the graduate level and up, the backbone of our innovation economy, is at risk of being lured abroad.

We need to invest in a diverse range of research, including social sciences and humanities. As Vivek Goel, president of the University of Waterloo, recently noted, if the pandemic was simply a biomedical issue, the problem would have been solved a year ago.

Fundamentally, investing in research is about investing in people: the graduate students who are the backbone of our research ecosystem; early-career researchers performing novel and innovative groundbreaking research; ordinary Canadians whose lives are bettered by cutting-edge research; and the communities who prosper from the ideas developed and commercialized from Canadian universities.

To close, I want to reiterate our thanks to the committee for undertaking this study.

I want to strongly encourage the committee to visit local campuses and research facilities when it's possible again. It's a way to both feel decades younger and look decades into the future.

Thank you, again.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you so much for your comments, Mr. Davidson.

You really have a committee here that's interested and keen to ask questions.

We will now go to Dr. Volker Gerdts. He's the director and chief executive officer of the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization.

Welcome. We're so pleased to have you all.

[Dr. Volker Gerdts, Director and Chief Executive Officer, Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization - International Vaccine Centre]

Good evening, Madam Chair and committee members.

Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to speak to you tonight. I'm speaking to you from Treaty 6 territory and the homeland of the Métis.

As you mentioned, my name is Volker Gerdts. I'm the director of the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization, also known as VIDO.

VIDO is a research institute at the University of Saskatchewan here in Saskatoon and one of Canada's largest research infrastructures focused on infectious disease research. We currently operate Canada's largest high-containment laboratory, which is one of the world's largest and most advanced facilities. We have about 170 researchers at the moment, from more than 28 different countries. We're 50% female and have 40% representing visible minorities.

I had an opportunity to address another committee last year. During the pandemic, VIDO was in the news. You might have heard about the work that was going on here. As one of the few such organizations in Canada, we moved a lot of our research onto the pandemic. We were the first in the country to isolate the virus, to develop an animal model and to have a vaccine in clinical testing. We have worked with almost 100 companies over the last almost two years now, testing their technologies, their prototypes, their vaccines and their therapeutics in our models here.

VIDO has really become one of Canada's go-to places for COVID-19 research. It has significantly contributed to the advances that are leading us eventually out of this pandemic.

We have our own vaccine, which is a protein subunit vaccine. You may have seen the news today. Novavax technology is now approved in Canada. VIDO and others are working on technologies like that.

Our own vaccine is moving forward. We have two targets right now. One is to make this vaccine available to Canadians as a booster vaccine to already-authorized vaccines, which we all assume we'll probably need in the future to be able to continue to address COVID.

More importantly, we are also working with African countries—with Uganda and Senegal—on making this technology available to low- and middle-income countries to make sure that those countries and those people around the world who currently don't have access to vaccines will have access to our vaccine. It is a technology that is ideal for use in remote areas such as Africa and remote Saskatchewan, or Canada's north, for that matter.

As a side note here, CEPI, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, which is the world's largest organization focused on emerging diseases, recently invested $6 million into VIDO's platforms, with the goal of developing these platforms for new COVID variants of concern as they emerge.

It's important to mention that over the last many years now, VIDO has received funding from the federal, provincial and municipal governments. Most important, probably, is the funding for the high-containment laboratory—the InterVac facility. InterVac is one of Canada's 10 major science infrastructures. Currently, we are funded through the MSI program provided through the CFI. It includes funding for our in-house manufacturing facility, which is now almost complete. It also includes funding for the vaccine.

Most recently, in budget 2021, VIDO received funding for what we call the “pandemic centre” and our vision to become Canada's centre for pandemic research. The vision really is to be one of the key research organizations in Canada, to focus on these emerging diseases, and to be able to rapidly respond to any new disease, whether it's a human disease or an animal disease.

Part of that is our in-house manufacturing facility, which will enable us to rapidly develop clinical trial batches that can then go into clinical development. It includes the construction of a new animal facility, which will enable us to house a wide range of exotic species. It is also to upgrade part of our existing containment facility to the highest level—to containment level 4—to enable us to respond to any threat in the future.

This is supported by the federal government, but it's important to note that it's also supported by the provincial government, the City of Saskatoon and many donors that have now provided millions of dollars in support of moving forward with this vision to build Canada's centre for pandemic research in the future.

From my perspective, in terms of what we can learn from the pandemic and where we want to go as a country in the future, it's great to see that Canada is currently developing a life science strategy and a biomanufacturing plan. The vision is to roll this out and make sure that Canada as a country in the future is able to domestically produce vaccine and does not have to depend on other countries for both the research and the manufacturing. It's great to see this vision coming forward.

The four things I'd like to point out before I finish—

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Dr. Gerdts, I hate to do this. I know the members really want to ask you questions, so hopefully you'll be able to finish that through questioning.

Thank you so very much.

We will now go to our six-minute round, and we'll start with Ryan Williams.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to all of our panellists. It is incredible to listen to all of you.

I'm going to start with Dr. Annan.

I think I heard you right when you said that half of your funding comes from non-governmental sources. How are you so successful in attracting that kind of funding?

[Dr. Robert Annan]

First, it's really baked right into our delivery model. We are not a granting organization like the granting councils. We actually proactively build research projects. We do that through the genome centres we have across the country. We have six centres. They are really on the ground, working with university researchers, companies and their provincial governments to find projects that are going to bring together multi-stakeholder groups. This is really a proactive business development.

Second, it's because these are all projects very much in the applied space. The idea here is really to make sure that we're demand-driven. We're going to draw from the great work going on in the universities to help advance specific companies or sectors. We want to make sure they actually put some money in the pot as well.

Finally, as I often say about Genome Canada, we're a national organization rather than a federal one. We receive federal money, but we work really hard to make sure that we're aligning what we do with provincial strategies so that provincial governments are also aligning their research investments with what we do. It's really by design that we end up with that mix.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Thank you, sir. It seems as though we can learn a lot from that organization, so that's great.

Mr. Davidson, in April 2018 you wrote in Policy Options magazine that “Canada has the potential and the strategic opportunity to become a global exemplar of this exchange of people, insight and innovation between communities and universities.”

It's been five years. Can you update us on the progress that has been made by your organization towards realizing this potential?

[Paul Davidson]

I will point to a couple of things. Rob and Dr. Gerdts have alluded to them. Research is a global exercise, so we do expressly work across borders and boundaries of all kinds.

In terms of attracting research talent, there have been some significant investments since 2018 to attract new talent to Canada, and that's been a really important development.

The other part of the talent exchange, frankly, is both to draw international students and to send Canadian students abroad. In the 2019 budget there was a major commitment to send 25,000 Canadian students abroad as undergraduates, and that's a really important initiative as well. It means we're not just poaching talent from around the world but also really exchanging ideas and enterprise across borders and boundaries.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Thank you, sir.

Dr. Gerdts, in The Globe and Mail on April 21, 2021, you mentioned that “Canada needs to develop a preparedness strategy that will allow the nation to rapidly respond to any new emerging disease.” You talked about the life science strategy, so perhaps I'll just ask you for an update. Has any of that work started? What does Canada have to do, besides what you have mentioned, to get ready for this kind of work?

[Dr. Volker Gerdts]

That was kind of what I was trying to address there.

The life science strategy, from what I understand, is really looking at a number of things. It supports research that's happening at the universities and then takes it into clinical development. At the same time, it invests into commercial industry—commercial manufacturers like Sanofi and Biovectra—and the resilience and upsell investments that we have seen recently, to allow commercial manufacturing.

It's a strategy that enables innovation to occur and to go into development. It then ensures that there is enough commercial manufacturing capacity in the country available to then produce those therapeutics and vaccines. It's a very important strategy. If you'll allow me, I'll address a few other points that I think are critical.

As we move forward, it is critical for the country to think about the fact that investment into the infrastructure is effective only if there is also investment into the operating support. The MSI program is one of those arms that obviously works to support those facilities. Unfortunately, for many facilities, that is only 60% of the operating cost, and it doesn't cover the expenses for research or even the researchers who are doing the work.

Another element, as we've heard before, is training. We need to train the next generation of our researchers. We need to have national training programs to ensure that we have enough workers who can do the critical work. During the pandemic, it was very hard for us to even find individuals who were willing to work day and night and weekends in level 3 conditions, which are conditions under which you can't go to the bathroom, you can't eat, you can't drink and so on.

Then the last one is to really ensure that there is good interaction between the manufacturing industry and our universities and small biotech.

I'm sorry for stealing your time.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

That's fine; those were great answers.

My last question will be on that manufacturing. I know that at one point you were looking at VIDO for former manufacturing capacity. Have you had that, and how do we reach that in Canada as a whole?

[Dr. Volker Gerdts]

We are happy to tell you that the construction of the manufacturing facility is almost complete. It's really just a matter of weeks now. The commissioning has begun, and we hope to have the facility commissioned in the summer to then start work in the fall on the first formulations, vaccine projects and so on.

Canada is investing heavily right now. There's the NRC facility in Montreal, but then also others that are moving forward. We want to make sure that as we do that and as we facilitate all of that, there is sustainable operating funding for those facilities in the future to ensure that they are being utilized as they should.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you so much, Mr. Williams, for your important questions.

Thank you to our witnesses.

Now we will go to Mr. Collins for six minutes.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thanks, Madam Chair. My first question will be for Dr. Annan.

Dr. Annan, I heard your opening, when you referenced seizing the opportunity of the moment.

I believe that many witnesses through our study have shared with us the challenges they faced with the pandemic, how their organizations pivoted in the early days and then how they seized the opportunity, as you've referenced. Can you elaborate on that and advise us as to how the federal government might assist with the opportunities that have come about as a result of COVID-19?

[Dr. Robert Annan]

Like the others that you've spoken with—frankly, like everybody—we've pivoted during the pandemic. What was fascinating about the science and research ecosytem was that COVID provided a very clear, shared sense of purpose. It didn't matter if you were, like Dr. Gerdts, working on actual vaccine development or if you were a social scientist who worked in communications and were suddenly interested in misinformation about COVID. It was really a rallying point for research across the spectrum to really come together and to self-organize, in a sense, around a lot of different initiatives.

What we did in genomics in terms of building a national surveillance system started out as a grassroots movement. There were labs across the country starting to do the work. We pulled that together into a national initiative, then that plugged into other things.

When it comes to what we've learned and what we can build on, that sense of mission is a real opportunity for us to move the needle in some of the areas where we've sometimes struggled. Things sometimes persisted in issues when it came to data sharing or other issues around health research across the country. We're confronting what we call wicked problems and things like climate change, for instance, or food security.

Hopefully we won't have quite the same urgency as we had with COVID, but providing some really clear signals from the federal level to say these are the sorts of things that we need to come together to really tackle....

I think providing strategic leadership is a big, important piece. Also, we saw an injection of funding that allowed the work to happen in the universities and in government research. You can't have one without the other. You need the fuel that drives the car; you need the foundation upon which you build.

Going forward, that sense of both purpose and mission built on a solid foundation will really position us well to confront the other challenges we face.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thanks, Dr. Annan.

My next question, through you, Madam Chair, is for Dr. Gerdts.

Dr. Gerdts, you emphasize the strong relationship between VIDO and all three levels of government. You also talked about the strong relationship you have with the private sector.

What can the government do to assist with forging better relationships between researchers and organizations like yours and the private sector? How do we better connect organizations with the private sector to ensure that we drive innovation to action? Can you help me with that?

[Dr. Volker Gerdts]

That's a good question. There are a number of elements that are relevant.

Number one, as I talked about, is building the infrastructure, building these centres like VIDO, national facilities that are open to the industry but open also to academic researchers, because that's really where the mixing occurs. That's where the partnerships occur. That's where the collaboration occurs.

Then it's the training programs. I think that's critical. We train academic researchers but many of them actually end up in industry. That is another good way of bringing industry and academia together in making sure that what we do benefits both.

Last, it's really the investment in the research, whether it's funding through the tri-councils or whether it's funding through Genome Canada or many other organizations that promote research where you have the early discovery element but then you bring in the potential commercial partner. You fund both. There's the strategic science fund that's currently available, but you're eligible only—or not only, but it's mainly designed for companies. Then you have your traditional CIHR and so on, that are mainly addressing the academics, and NSERC and so on.

We really want the future to have research programs in which we're funding already the early discovery, but at the same time bringing the commercial partners into this early on, so that we see the seamless transition from discovery to commercial development. That's where Canada is maybe not as effective as other countries that are changing some of their systems, whether it's Germany, the U.K. or other countries, where there is more of a focus on funding discovery research with a potential commercial application and bringing the partners in early on so that the transition occurs rapidly and smoothly.