Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Etobicoke North for sharing her time with me.
This is an extremely serious situation that not only five countries in Africa face, the whole region of West Africa faces, and if we are not prudent, the entire could face it.
There is a three-prong approach that I would encourage the government to take good note of, and perhaps act on and advise Canadians about.
The first is one that everyone would agree on. It is to contain the situation. It started in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. Incidentally, the Canada-Africa Parliamentary Association was planning a bilateral visit to both Liberia and Sierra Leone at the end of August. We felt that out of respect and concern for our colleagues, we should postpone that visit, not even thinking that it would get as bad as it is currently. It just goes to show that if we did that, there is an entire array of people who are cancelling visits or business trips to those countries. That is one of the factors that has to be looked at.
Those are the three countries. However, it has now spread to Nigeria, and I gather there has been a case or more in Senegal. It has to be contained, and that is not easy because these countries, Liberia in particular, have lost a great number of their health professionals who were trying to help the population fight this terrible virus.
The containment is also difficult because of the long incubation period. As we know, it is 21 days. The World Health Organization has now given notice that it could take at least nine months before the world can feel secure that the virus has been contained. Therefore, we are looking at a very difficult, costly, and demanding episode in front of us.
Canada needs to help protect Médicins sans frontières, and others who are volunteering to go there as well, so they can protect the populations wherever they go. However, it goes beyond that.
The Canada-Africa Parliamentary Association executive met with Ivory Coast's Minister of Foreign Affairs this afternoon. As the minister explained to us, 26% of Ivory Coast's population is from neighbouring countries. As a result, movement is continuous. Ivory Coast borders two of the countries I just mentioned, and they are already afflicted and affected by this virus.
I must congratulate the Ivorian authorities for what they have done. Apparently, 90% of the population has a mobile phone. The authorities used them to inform everyone about best practices to avoid contamination and the transmission of the virus. For example, the minister told us that people do not shake hands anymore. To avoid any contact that might spread the virus, they use gestures to say hello and goodbye. These measures are fairly simple, but by contacting 90% of the population, they have so far managed to prevent the spread of the virus.
However, there are other countries in West Africa.
These other countries, whether Ghana, Togo, or closer, Cameroon and so on, also need help to make sure that this is contained. We are not talking about immediately, or 21 days, which is the incubation period; we are talking about nine months at least. They need help financially, and with professionals, so they are able to train other professionals they need in a very short timeframe.
Financially and on a professional level, the ability to contain the virus is the primary objective.
The second one is more domestic. Canadians have to be made aware of this, and of the measures they need to take, so that if this virus ever reaches our soil, it is not spread. We had a case not long ago.
A young woman returning from Sierra Leone was hospitalized and quarantined in Gatineau because she had a fever. Thank God, she was not infected with Ebola. However, it is not impossible that one of our constituents might become infected.
Indeed, we should ensure that the general public knows what to do to keep from spreading this virus, which can kill 50% to 90% of people affected, depending on the population.
I was listening this afternoon to one of my colleagues on the government side. He did not give me permission to speak publicly, but it was in a meeting, so I will tell the details.
His daughter was working in Liberia and she married someone from there. She saw a mother of seven kids whose husband died of Ebola, and she wanted to have the body of her husband to bury it. However, the authorities would not give it. They put the body in a bag and put in all kinds of chemicals to contain it, and they buried it. Somehow, during the night, they convinced a guardian at wherever the body was buried to get it. They got it and brought it home. The seven children were all infected and they have all died now.
This is the reality on the ground that they face right now. We have to help them contain it, and we have to ensure it is not transmitted here.
My second proposal is therefore to prepare Canadians.
Third, we need to find a cure for this virus. I would like to applaud a number of our fellow Canadians in the medical field who have worked on it. It seems that the Department of Defence has also done some research.
It is known that viruses frequently mutate. So far the human race has been fairly lucky, in that this contamination is not spread in the air. It is spread by transmission of bodily fluids. However, if ever this virus mutates to the point that it can be transmitted by airborne contagion, we are facing a humanitarian crisis worldwide. We need to address this. We saw how these things can happen when they spread.
The other bracket I need to open is the economic impact. In Nigeria, where it has not spread as widely as it has in Liberia or Sierra Leone, already four per cent of the economy has tanked. The gross domestic product has tanked by four per cent. It is the same thing in Sierra Leone, and it is affecting places like Ivory Coast where there is no contagion right now. That is because people are cancelling meetings; people are not going there.
We saw that happen in Toronto when the SARS disease reached our shores, and that was spread by air. We in Canada have a fairly good health system and a good prevention system, and a fairly well-advised population, yet we saw the impact it had on Toronto and its area.
If we do not find a way to first stop this transmission and a way to fight it, then we are looking at an incredibly devastating situation. It will be in Africa to start, and it will spread elsewhere, and eventually it will reach the whole world.
We, our government and Canadians, have a responsibility to address this. It is as imminent and urgent as anything we are facing now. If we do not address it, unfortunately we will all end up paying a huge price. We can avoid that, and we should avoid that.
That was the gist of my message.
Now, this virus needs to be contained not only in the affected countries, but also in the neighbouring countries. We need to help those countries financially and enable professionals to travel there. We owe so much to those professionals who are willing to go.
We need to prepare Canadians as a preventive measure and put in place the resources needed to find a way to kill this virus.