Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Health and it concerns very serious allegations of negligence in Health Canada's controls on clinical trials of new drugs. It took months before cancer patient Oscar Mulder was finally given a revised consent form for the drug Iressa, despite many deaths from the drug in Japan.
Why this long, possibly life-threatening delay and what action is the minister taking to ensure that the patients in clinical trials give fully informed consent before they participate so that they are aware of the risks they take before they take these new drugs?