Mr. Speaker, I think the issue at Sandoz, as my colleague has outlined, is something that has really made the situation very serious, but it is part of an overall shortage.
The whole issue of sole-source suppliers is something that does require a very thorough investigation. We do know that Canadian hospitals relied 100% on this one company for their injectable opiates, for examples, and they were not given adequate warning. In fact, we know that this company was initially warned by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that they had to make upgrades, and yet this information was not properly communicated.
It does raise the question, just as we saw with the H1N1 vaccine, that the federal government as a major player has to be involved to ensure that these kinds of developments can be prevented. We could have prevented this. I am sure that the people at the plant want to get back to work and do the job they know needs to be done. However, if there is no system in place and no involvement by the federal government, then we have a disaster on our hands.