Media availability - January 10, 2005

Remarks by Dr. David Butler-Jones

Chief Public Health Officer, Public Health Agency of Canada

Check against delivery

Good afternoon ladies and gentleman and welcome to the Emergency Operations Centre at the Public Health Agency. I also want to acknowledge employees of the Public Health Agency, who are listening in to this news conference, and say welcome.

I'm David Butler-Jones and I'm the Chief Public Health Officer for Canada.

We invited you here today because we thought you might be interested in hearing from Dr. Paul Gully, recently named deputy CPHO, and Dr. Andrea Ellis, Manager of Outbreak Response for the Agency, who have recently returned from the tsunami-stricken area in Southeast Asia, and who tell you first hand what the situation is and what they saw needs to be addressed.

Before we do, I want to briefly outline the Public Health Agency's role in response to the emergency in the region.

Since we first learned of the unprecedented disaster, PHAC has been, not only been open to requests for help, but actively pursuing and communicating our willingness to deploy our expertise and materiel in ways that may be useful and needed. I want to thank all employees who have gone the extra mile in making this possible.

• Specifically, we've made available a portion of the National Emergency Stockpile System (NESS) to be deployed to the most affected areas.
• Some of this has already been sent, other supplies will follow as requested.
• Also, we've offered significant quantities of antibiotics, analgesics and other controlled drugs to treat the injured and ill.
• Offered the WHO to send on short notice: team leaders, communicable disease epidemiologists, laboratory experts and technicians, logisticians, data managers and risk communications experts.
• In addition, PHAC, at the request of WHO, is looking at the possibility of deploying a mobile laboratory to the region to help with the basic diagnosis of, for example, diarrhoea (cholera and dysentery), typhoid and meningitis.

I want to say that we're looking at other ways of helping, particularly as soon the affected countries more and more start turning their attention to reconstruction and recovery, rather than simply dealing with the admittedly enormous emergency. So, that's where we are now.

But I think this event is really about Dr. Gully and Dr. Ellis, so I want to turn the microphone over to them...

• Remarks by Dr. Paul Gully
• Remarks by Dr. Andrea Ellis

Biography

• Dr. Butler-Jones