Mr. Speaker, on May 10 I put a question to the Minister of Health and I was not very impressed by his response. My question had to do with the tainted drug issue in the United States.
In the U.S. a drug called gentamicin sulfate was under question. That drug is used to treat severe infections such as blood poisoning and inflammation of the heart lining. The drug is imported in the United States in bulk and there is contamination in the product. I asked the minister what safeguards were taken in Canada to ensure the same thing did not happen.
Eighty percent of the active ingredients in many of the generic drugs in the U.S. come from third world countries. There is a quality issue involved here. Some of these contaminated products work their way into drugs which are given to citizens of the United States. At least 17 people died as a result of using gentamicin sulfate in the United States.
I was shocked by the casual reply by the minister. The minister said: “The manufacture and sale of pharmaceutical products in Canada is done in accordance with exacting regulatory requirements to ensure the purity of product and safety of consumers”. The minister did not go into the kind of detail that we would expect on an issue that could be serious.
On these generic drugs that are coming into Canada, what safeguards do we have? How much do we know about the companies that are manufacturing them? How many of these drugs come into Canada? Is there any evidence at all, slight as it might be, that some of the products used in these drugs might be contaminated? What kind of regulatory inspections do we use on facilities that manufacture these products in third world countries? In other words, if it happened in the United States, why could it not happen here? I do not think we should have to go to the trouble of putting everything on the Order Paper. I would think that the minister would understand that it could be a problem in this country. We raised the alarm and we have to have some evidence from the government that it is not happening and that some kind of inspection process is being used.
Some of these drugs are too powerful. Some of them are not powerful enough. Some of them are absolutely biologically contaminated because the inspection process in some third world countries is not being carried out to meet U.S. or Canadian standards. Why is the situation in Canada any different from the situation in the United States? If deaths resulted in the United States because of contamination in generic drugs, why could it not happen here?
I do not expect a detailed report tonight from the minister because we have never got a detailed report in reference to any question put on the floor. However, I am putting the ministry on alert that tomorrow I will be putting questions on the Order Paper so we can get a detailed response to what I think could be a problem in this country.
I know the parliamentary secretary will respond tonight and we look forward to it. However, we do not expect to get the kind of answers tonight that we would like.