Health committee  Well, that's an interesting point you raise, because, as I mentioned on Monday, a lot of other countries have struggled with the prices for these new, very promising, life-changing cystic fibrosis drugs. There was a stalemate in many of these countries between the reimbursement b

Health committee  Frankly, it can't get much lower, can it? I think one of the driving forces—the impetus behind these changes—is the realization that back in the day when we chose the basket of comparator countries that we've used since about the late 1980s, we did so on the basis of a policy p

Health committee  I guess that's the flip side or another facet of R and D. We don't see any evidence of that. I will say that clinical trial intensity is going down in developed countries across the board, as industry kind of moves their R and D efforts into emerging markets. We've seen a bit of

Health committee  Yes. I guess you could say it's been declining for a couple of years now. The regulations were adopted in August 2019, so I'm not sure how that coincides with that time period. It's actually declining less dramatically in Canada than it is in many of these other countries, includ

Health committee  They are, almost without exception.

Health committee  Again, we tried to address this in the written answers to some of the questions we undertook to follow up on, on Monday. We certainly don't see that. Actual applications—what we call new drug submissions—to Health Canada for new active substances, in other words new innovative me

Health committee  Of course they are, and in doing so, they're just behaving rationally, and they do this in every country that tries to introduce reforms to try to contain pharmaceutical expenditures. It's just the nature of the game. Again, Dr. Levine made this point in his opening remarks. We

Health committee  I don't agree with this claim. It isn't to boost the figures. That's the truth.

Health committee  I'll need to give you the answer later, Mr. Thériault. I don't know. I don't have the figures in front of me.

Health committee  Mitch, did you want to add something?

Health committee  I believe that all the measures that you just described will be part of our plan, once the new regime comes into effect in January 2021. We'll proceed in stages, starting with the implementation of the new price ceilings, which are the result of the new comparator countries. We

Health committee  The other thing to consider is that in the absence of some kind of threshold, ceiling or ultimate cap, what is the alternative? The alternative is.... I think a lot of people would say, “Well, you negotiate.” As Dr. Levine pointed out, in Canada prescription medication isn't cove

Health committee  Since I don't have the data in front of me, it would be difficult to respond on the spot. If you want, I can commit to analyzing the data and figures provided by the Canadian Organization for Rare Disorders. I honestly don't know whether this is true or false. I'd need to ask my

Health committee  I don't know whether that's true or false. I know that very high-cost drugs currently account for 40% of total pharmaceutical spending in Canada.

Health committee  That's correct. “Cost-utility ratio” is the official term.