Health committee  Could I—

Health committee  I could add to Barry's point about the mixed messaging, which I think was the start of that question. Certainly we talked about the 30-day supply, but we are definitely discouraging patients, particularly if they're vulnerable, symptomatic or don't feel comfortable coming into the pharmacy.

Health committee  If I could just add one more point to Dr. Power's point.... The other way we're mitigating that and helping seniors and people who cannot come into the pharmacy is managing that through delivering out to those communities—those rural communities and places where those people might be—and discouraging those vulnerable populations from coming into the pharmacy any more than they need to.

Health committee  Thank you for that great question. Absolutely. As I alluded to in my remarks earlier, pharmacists are doing everything they can and working within the full scope of current practice across the country, which is unfortunately quite fragmented. In our province, Alberta, pharmacists are being immensely utilized.

Health committee  Maybe I can just—

Health committee  Maybe I could just reinforce what my colleague Dr. Power was saying in terms of what we've done. We're also really trying to alleviate the burden on many of the seniors we serve every day. The points that I made in my remarks about deliveries are part of that, recognizing that we want these folks to stay at home and we want to give them the access to medications they need.

Health committee  As others have, we've had engagement with the chief public health officer through the health care professional forums. I think the engagement really accelerated around COVID around late January, early February. We were quite involved before and since that time.

Health committee  Thank you, Barry. Thank you, Mr. Chair. We know physical distancing is especially important for vulnerable Canadians such as seniors, people with chronic diseases and those who are at particular risk of coming into contact with COVID, which is why it’s critical that we help those people stay at home and why pharmacies have ramped up home medication deliveries in the last few weeks.

Health committee  Thank you for your question. First of all, pharmacists are not currently involved in dispensing or selling medical marijuana at all to patients, just to clarify.

Health committee  Secondly, I agree with you. Pharmacists are concerned, as others are, about the potential risks of smoking marijuana and all substances, and the toxicity associated with doing that. As others on the panel have mentioned, other forms of marijuana are available. The research is evolving around them.

Health committee  For pharmacists dispensing medical marijuana....

Health committee  With other medical professionals and patients, I think we're all aligned on the fact that we agree that there needs to be an increase in the level of robust evidence around the therapeutic effects and risks of marijuana. In spite of that, we've noticed over the last number of years that patients are deriving benefit from these medications.

Health committee  Good morning, everyone. I thank you for the opportunity to be here today. My name is Shelita Dattani. I'm a practising pharmacist and I'm the director of practice development and knowledge translation at the Canadian Pharmacists Association. I'm here today on behalf of Canada's 42,000 pharmacists, who are medication experts and whose job it is to ensure that drug therapy is safe and appropriate for our patients.

Health committee  I'll start. In terms of costs, I think Andrew is going to be able to answer this question much more effectively than I am, but I'll give you an example. The second most common reason for a drug-related adverse event when a patient presents to an emergency department is an antibiotic-related adverse event.

Health committee  Thank you very much for your question. You are right that there are a lot of unnecessary prescriptions, particularly—I always think of that 30%—in community environments where practitioners are often a little more siloed and aren't in formal microbial stewardship programs. CPhA has taken some good leadership over the last year in increasing the awareness to its own profession, particularly in primary care, where there hasn't been a lot of education, and even more so for primary care pharmacists, regarding how they can step up.