Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and members of the committee.
I'm Rear-Admiral Edmundson, deputy commander of military personnel command in the Canadian Armed Forces.
Within our organization, our focus is people from the point of recruiting until they transition to life after service. Integral to the military service is our obligation to take care of our members and to provide them the highest standard of medical care available.
With me today are Brigadier-General Andrew Downes, surgeon general and commander of the Canadian Forces health services group, who will deliver opening remarks, and Colonel Rakesh Jetly, senior psychiatrist and mental health adviser within the Canadian Forces health services group.
Also joining us is Dr. Cyd Courchesne, chief medical officer from Veterans Affairs Canada.
I will be speaking initially about the general approach for the care of uniformed personnel. My colleagues will address more specifically technical aspects in considerations related to mefloquine.
We take the health and well-being of our Canadian Armed Forces members very seriously, whether at home during their normal duties or when they're supporting operations such as the floods recently in the Ontario region, and more importantly, when they conduct operations overseas.
Overseas missions, in particular, often require our personnel to perform their duties in extreme environmental and operational conditions.
In such conditions, force protection, that is, the protection and the well-being of our soldiers, our sailors and our aviators, is always a top priority and one that we must balance with the fighting efficiency and operational effectiveness of the force that we have deployed.
Force protection can include the need for specialized medications designed to protect against the environmental and operational hazards in the area. I personally have deployed on several occasions and have been prescribed anti-malarial medication, which I believe was beneficial to me, given my experience of being eaten alive, literally eaten alive, by mosquitoes when I was in Djibouti, Djibouti just a couple of years ago when deployed as the commander of Combined Task Force 150.
In making decisions on medical treatment and medications, we base our judgments on research and science and best practices from the broader medical community.
The office of the Canadian Armed Forces surgeon general engages and works with the wider Canadian medical community and allies to stay informed of new developments. When these engagements and research alert us that change is required, we act on this and we adjust to ensure the continued provision of the best possible medical care and force protective measures available.
Given the nature of what we do in the Canadian Armed Forces and where we do it, there will be some who, as a result of their operational tours, will experience injuries and symptoms of injuries not seen. We acknowledge that some of those affected are not well and need assistance. We encourage them and anyone who knows of anyone who is in need of assistance to reach out to their friends, to their colleagues, to health practitioners inside and outside the Canadian Armed Forces or to whomever they trust so that together we can assist them and their families in their time of need.
I will now turn it over to Brigadier-General Downes.
Thank you.