Mr. Speaker, with regard to part (a) (i), (ii), (iii), (iv), from the program’s inception until late 2018, the Global Public Health Intelligence Network, GPHIN, alerts were identified and issued by the program’s analysts. The purpose of an alert is to direct international and Canadian subscribers to a particular media article without any summary or additional analysis. In the fall of 2018, the health security infrastructure branch, HSIB, began a review of program information products, including GPHIN alerts and their associated approval processes.
Following internal discussions, a decision was made to raise the approval level to HSIB’s vice-president in order to maintain awareness of the Public Health Agency of Canada’s, PHAC’s, senior officials concerning alerts being published by the system.
Approval of the GPHIN daily reports, which provides a comprehensive summary of multiple media articles, remained at the analyst level and so had no change. In September 2020, approval for alerts was set at the director level.
All other GPHIN information products, such as the GPHIN daily report, previously called the situational awareness section daily report, continue to be distributed directly from GPHIN to subscribers, including senior management at PHAC and other government departments.
At no time has GPHIN been directed to cease or slow its information gathering. Information-sharing activities continue to take place in a timely manner. GPHIN’s primary role as a global event-based surveillance system has remained unchanged, and its capacity has been enhanced over a number of years via collaborations with partners such as the National Research Council.
With regard to part (a) (v), (vi), (vii), and parts (b) and (c), the above changes were made internally to PHAC. There is no documentation indicating that the change in the approval process for GPHIN alerts was communicated to the organizations listed above.