Madam Chair, I want to thank my colleague. As members of the Standing Committee on Health, we do not always see eye to eye, but we greatly enjoy working together.
As I said earlier, at the start of my remarks, the federal government is responsible for legislating Internet sales and transactions. However, it is not the federal government's responsibility to determine how pharmacists or medical practitioners will address the various problems that may arise in conjunction with Internet drug sales.
In Quebec, in accordance with the Pharmacy Act, a pharmacist may only sell drugs to patients whose prescriptions have been written by an individual authorized under Quebec legislation or legislation from a Canadian province that would authorize that individual to prescribe medication if they practised in Quebec. I do not think that we can draw any comparisons with the United States.
Also, the physicians' code of ethics stipulates that, in order to issue a prescription to a patient, a Quebec physician must have examined that patient, formulated a diagnosis and a treatment plan, in addition to providing information to that patient and obtaining his or her consent. I do not think that this is applicable to customers living in the United States, unless they live in a state bordering the jurisdiction in which the Internet pharmacy is located. If so, such individuals could cross the border to obtain the various services they need. Otherwise, I do not believe that this is sufficient.
Based on what the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health said, I think that the minister wants to adopt a very conservative approach to Internet pharmacies and I congratulate him on this. I want to reiterate what I said earlier, and I hope that his approach to breast implants will be equally cautious.