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A 2 - The Oakville Beaver, Wednesday December 4, 2002 Call for independent drug agency mirrors Young's recommendation (Continued from page 1) · handled responsibly in the past Vanessa would still be alive. Young appeared in June before the Romanow Commission on the Future of Health Care in Canada where he made major points about prescription drug safety and Health Canada's role in ensuring that safe ty. (Chaired by former Saskatchewan premier Roy Romanow, the commission con ducted a Canada-wide fact-finding mission.) At that time, Young asked for an independent and adequately funded drug safety agency that would oper ate at arm's length from the federal government and report to Parliament. He requested a compulsory sys tem of reporting and investigating adverse drug reactions and deaths to replace the voluntary process currently used, as well as proper patient warnings about drugs. Finally. Young asked for Health Canada's relationship with drug companies made more transparent. Romanow's Recommendation 37 states "A new National Drug Agency should be established to evaluate and approve new prescrip tion drugs, provide evaluation of existing drugs, negotiate and con tain drug prices and provide com prehensive, objective and accurate information to health care providers and to the public." Later in the report, the Commission says this agency "would be established as a federal agency with federal regulatory powers, operate independently from Health Canada and report directly to Parliament." "We are very pleased the com missioner has seen fit to recom mend an independent drug agency," said Young. "It was one of our key recommendations to the commis sion to improve drug safety, out of which will flow additional recom mendations we and other Canadians made." Young is also recommending that Romanow be asked to head up this body. "It would require a person of the highest integrity and competence, as well as independent thinking. Roy fits the bill," said Young. "Combined with the vast knowl edge he has compiled in the last 18 months, he would be a formidable opponent of those who would com promise the safety of our children for profit or political gain. We are quite confident no one could pull the wool over his eyes." Young says he still harbours pessimism given the federal gov ernment's response to date to the coroner's jury recommendations. For example, in September 2001 Winnipeg North Centre NDP MP Judy Wasylycia-Leis introduced a motion in the House to create a sys tem for the mandatory reporting of adverse drug reactions - one of the suggestions offered by the jury. During the debate, Oakville MP Bonnie Brown said such a system has "great potential" but maintained that Health Canada "has no clear evidence that mandatory reporting would result in the submission of quality information and thereby substantially increase its capacity to detect drug safety issues." Later, Brown says "I know I can call on the Members of the House to support our future initiatives to improve the post-market surveil lance activities of Health Canada, among which mandatory reporting is one." More than a year later, says Young, nothing has been done except some minor re-organization. He is also worried that the influ ence big drug companies wield will come to the fore when they hire the best public relations firms to under mine Romanow's efforts and pre vent his recommendations from becoming law. The last thing the industry wants, says Young, are changes to the relationship they now enjoy with Health Canada. Young isn't alone in his think ing: in a written submission to the Romanow Commission, the Edmonton Highlands Health Care Action Group wrote, "We are con cerned that some pharmaceutical companies spend more of their budgets on marketing than on research and development. This makes us wonder if the drugs we are getting are really the best for us, or simply the ones with the best ad campaign." TOUR DELIGHT: Hundreds of onlookers at the annual Appleby College House Tour had to wait in line outside (above), but many, like Shiela Smith and Darlene Lepp (right) found the waiting worthwhile. Others were treated to the music of the Variante Harp and Flute Duo (top) Natalie Younglai and Catherine Richardson. Also featured in the tour was Appleby C ollege's John Bell Chapel (above right and below). 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