Madam Chair, I would like to go back to the minister's last answer because she likes to quote Dr. Heymann, the executive director of the WHO. She claims that Dr. Heymann said that Canada was the first to implement screening measures at airports.
I would like to say that it is not so important how quickly this was done, it is how effectively it was done. He obviously felt that it was not done effectively. On April 23 he said that we now had these areas with a high magnitude of disease and a great risk of transmission locally outside of the usual health workers. He said that we were still exporting these cases.
April 23 was the day on which the WHO actually gave the travel advisory to Toronto. The next day, April 24, Dr. Heymann said:
When you see exportation of cases it makes you question whether the control measures going on are effective to control the disease. Possibly Toronto was not able to really control the spread.
When we hear these kinds of comments coming from the same individual, obviously he was very concerned and convinced that we were exporting the disease. The screening measures at the airport were not done appropriately and are still not being done appropriately. The minister has suggested that she is doing everything appropriately and in a timely fashion. I would suggest that is not happening.
We know that someone can leave China, arrive in a third country, and then travel on to another airport in Calgary or Edmonton, for example, without appropriate screening measures in place for SARS. If the minister has learned anything she should learn that we cannot take a passive approach to something as serious as SARS. It could elevate into a national disaster yet. Now that we have it contained, I would ask the minister to please not do that.
Does the minister have the appropriate screening measures in place right now for those third party travellers coming into this country? We know that the SARS virus is out of control in China and, as sure as we are in this place this evening, we are in danger. Will the minister do the right thing and make sure those measures are in place?