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Mr. Adam van Koeverden (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health and to the Minister of Sport, Lib.)

Feb/11/22 10:08:58 a.m.
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Re: Bill C-10

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to talk about the motion before us today. Some parts of the country are starting to relax public health restrictions within their jurisdictions, but we have to assess the current situation carefully to determine what to do next. As all members of the House of Commons know, protecting Canadians from COVID‑19 continues to be this government's number-one priority. We are very lucky to have a number of tools at our disposal, including screening and testing, to help us determine when and how we can lift restrictions as safely as possible. Rapid tests have proven themselves to be a powerful tool over the last few months. Let me start by outlining the impact of COVID-19 testing and reducing the transmission of the virus, which in turn helps us move past some restrictions and return to certain forms of normalcy. COVID-19 will continue to be part of our lives, and testing and screening will remain important tools to rapidly detect and isolate new cases, to support follow-up with close contacts and to prevent outbreaks in the community by breaking the chain of transmission. While those who have symptoms of COVID-19 should isolate, the fact of the matter is that someone can have COVID-19 and not know it. Testing is the only way we can confirm if someone has COVID-19. Someone knowing they are infected is a really important aspect of protecting their family and the people they are going to encounter. Over the past two years, right up until Omicron hit, public health units across Canada relied heavily on PCR tests and contact tracing to confirm the presence of COVID‑19. That was funded by $3 billion from the Government of Canada under the safe restart agreement. The data has been really useful in understanding who has an infection, where in our communities the virus was spreading and how much the virus might be circulating in our communities. As an additional layer of protection, rapid tests have allowed us to expand testing to a broader range of situations. Rapid tests have proven to be safe, effective and very easy to administer. They produce results in as little as 15 minutes, allowing for immediate self-isolation and breaking the chain of transmission right away. Regardless of the type of test, we have seen from our international partners that testing matters, whether we look south or to Europe, where testing has been used throughout the pandemic. Rapid tests, including self-tests, have helped and will help individuals reduce the risk of spreading the virus to their families, co-workers and communities. They also empower Canadians by providing them with additional information about their own health and can help inform their choices and personal risk management. This will be even truer as other public health measures begin to get lifted. With the availability of new types of tests, the use of PCR tests is also shifting. As we transition out of omicron, there are a variety of testing options available. Recognizing the importance of widespread testing across Canada, the government has taken a number of measures to procure, fund and distribute COVID-19 tests, and intends to continue to do so in the near future. The Government of Canada has been buying and providing rapid tests free of charge to the provinces and territories since October 2020 when the first rapid test was approved by Health Canada. These rapid tests have supported the broader testing strategy that the provinces and territories have implemented in response to the highly transmissible omicron variant, including expanded school-based testing, community testing and workplace screening. We have been behind the provinces and territories from the very beginning, working in conjunction with public health authorities in the provinces and territories, and we will continue to support them throughout this pandemic. This is why, since the beginning of the pandemic, we have purchased more than 490 million rapid tests at a total cost of almost $3.4 billion. About 140 million tests were purchased for the month of January alone, and those are on their way to communities today. These tests have been provided free of charge to the provinces and territories and distributed to workplaces and community organizations to reach those most at risk. More rapid tests are being secured as we speak, to be delivered on an ongoing basis. Because our government wants to support the safe reopening of our economy, we have also been supporting businesses, not-for-profit organizations and indigenous communities to get access to free tests. The Government of Canada has provided $6.6 million to the Canadian Red Cross to distribute tests to charities, not-for-profits and indigenous organizations. The federal government also provides rapid tests to first nations and northern, remote and isolated communities. We have provided $8.1 million to the Canadian Chamber of Commerce to support distribution to small and medium-sized businesses throughout local chambers in an attempt to support the reopening of the economy and a safe return to the workplace. Indeed, I can say this is true, because my local chamber of commerce in Milton contacted my office just the other day to ask if we would like some of those tests, as I am a member of the chamber in Milton. I thank the chamber for its ongoing work. Organizations of 200 or more employees, including federally regulated businesses, are also able to receive free COVID-19 rapid tests directly from the Government of Canada. Through the distribution of more than 8.5 million rapid tests, these screening programs have been a really effective tool in identifying individuals with COVID-19, helping to reduce transmission and community outbreaks. In all of the above initiatives, the government is working closely with our partners, because a challenge that is national in scale requires a cohesive and unified national approach. However, as this pandemic evolves, so must our actions. With the omicron variant, we have seen a sharp increase in demand for rapid tests. Canadians realized that they had to have an additional tool to manage their own risks, and that is why the government introduced Bill C-10, an act respecting certain measures related to COVID-19. If passed, Bill C-10 will allow the purchase and distribution across the country of an additional 2.5 billion dollars' worth of COVID-19 rapid tests for the upcoming months. If passed, this funding will allow the government to continue providing the provinces and territories with an adequate supply of rapid tests to allow the early detection of COVID-19 positive cases and mitigate the transmission of the virus by reaching out to a greater number of Canadians. It will allow us to continue to partner with the Canadian Red Cross to deliver rapid tests to community organizations, and will allow us to continue to support screening programs operated by private businesses and federal departments and agencies. It will also allow Canadians across the country to access rapid tests to better manage their risks as they go back to their activities and we all learn to live with COVID-19. We all know that COVID-19 remains a global threat. We recognize that we will need to learn to live with it and find the right balance between a progressive return to normalcy and an ongoing surveillance of virus transmission in order to quickly identify and isolate cases. Rapid tests will help us toward that transition. The evidence bears out that testing is an integral component of the suite of public health measures to keep the economy open and Canadians safe. To that end, the Government of Canada is committed to helping supply tests to the provinces and territories, business, non-profits and federal workplaces. These initiatives and other public health measures are integral to protecting Canadians from COVID‑19 and supporting the economy as we move into the next phase of the pandemic. I welcome questions from my colleagues.

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