Health committee  NACI is not doing such modelling at this point in time. We're currently looking more at the deployment of vaccine and what category of people should be vaccinated to achieve the largest public health gains. We can absolutely submit that question to the PHAC modellers.

Health committee  We sure hope not, but it's possible that it will come to life. I think at this point in time, we have the sense that the U.K. variant is the one that is the most prominent in most of our provinces. We're trying through various public health measures to limit the spread of that variant.

Health committee  The NACI perspective has nothing to do with it, so I can only speak from the Quebec perspective, where every single positive case is being checked for variants. As for the rest of Canada, I will refer to Guillaume.

Health committee  Thank you for the question. I have read the data from the INSPQ, and it is very intriguing indeed. It's also very good to have 85% effectiveness in a very elderly and very sick population living in long-term care centres, or CHSLDs. According to the immunological data, the second dose makes the antibodies become more mature and therefore much stronger and more active.

Health committee  I can take this one, if you don't mind, Mr. Chair. You have seen that NACI had recommended, given the data on hand at the time of publication, that we ask that the two doses be given preferably within a 42-day window period. That was based on the fact that in the two phase three trials, the Pfizer and the Moderna trials, participants got their second dose between 21 or 28 days, up to 42 days, and that was an average estimate.

Health committee  From a NACI standpoint, we will follow what Health Canada allows. We hope it will not require phase one and phase two. The discussion is already ongoing, but I don't see anybody from Health Canada here, so I don't know if Kim wants to answer that one.

Health committee  Mr. Chair, the difficulty here is that prioritization is a provincial and territorial aspect and decision. NACI has put frontline essential workers, including the police, as a stage two priority. They are there, at the same level as ambulance workers and the others. As long as the province you're in puts them on the list, it will happen.

Health committee  That is correct. I have another meeting for my group. I'm sorry.

Health committee  Thank you very much. I would like to begin by thanking the Chair and the members of the Standing Committee on Health for inviting me to testify. I am a pediatrician, a microbiologist-infectiologist and a clinical researcher at CHU Sainte-Justine, as well as a full professor in the Department of Microbiology, Infectiology and Immunology at the Université de Montréal.