The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Meet The Person In Charge Of Buying Canada's Vaccines

Episode Date: June 15, 2021

A feature interview with the minister of public service and procurement, Anita Anand.  She was a rookie MP and a rookie cabinet minister when she arrived in 2019, within months she was in charge of buying everything Canada would need to survive the pandemic -- from masks to vaccines.  She takes us inside the buying process and also inside what it might be like for Canadians who choose not to get vaccinated. And tells us that 80 percent of Canadians will be fully vaccinated by the end of July.

Hello there, Peter Mansbridge here with the latest episode of The Bridge. You are just moments away from an exclusive interview with the person responsible for negotiating and buying those millions of vaccines coming into the country. And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here. Ever since the pandemic started, I've tried to understand and wanted to try and get behind the whole sense of how Canada got into the vaccine market. Because we were up against it right from the beginning. We didn't have our own production. And that's an argument one can have about this government and past governments. But aside from that, I wanted to try and understand, well, what did we do and how did we do it? Because it started off as a trickle. Right now, it's kind of a torrent of vaccines coming into the country. We're millions ahead of where we said we were going to be in terms of the number of vaccines that have been purchased and are heading towards Canada.

And we're doing, you know, not badly in terms of the vaccination program. But how did it actually operate? What were we up against? How did we negotiate? What did we have, if anything, in our hands to negotiate with aside from cash? Well, obviously there are a number of people responsible for that, but the minister who's in charge of what's called procurement is a Toronto MP, first elected in 2019, and put right into the cabinet. Her name's Anita Anand.

And you've probably seen her in different news stories over the last months, sometimes at the center of some controversy, sometimes not. But I wanted to talk to her. And I finally got through to her the other day. And she agreed immediately. So last night we had a long conversation about this whole topic. And she's obviously proud of where we are right now. She thinks we're doing extremely well.

But there's more to the conversation than the opening kind of what we tend to call in the business the message track. And that conversation I think is one that you're going to find interesting in terms of what's been going on these last, what is it now, 16 months. So let's get to it. Here is my interview with the Minister of Public Service and Procurement, Anita Anand. Minister, when I go through all the various statistics on vaccines, and I kind of break it down, countries all around the world, there are a lot of different categories you could go to, but the two that I tend to go to are first vaccines, and Canada does extremely well there, up near the top, if not the top. We're closing in on 70%. And the second category is fully vaccinated, or two doses. And there were, you know, quite a bit behind in terms of that first dose number uh it's starting to move but it's down just just out of single digits i think we're around 12 right now now of those two

numbers which one do you look at most which one to you is the important one one well uh peter i have many important numbers in my mind and i will say that of course seeing that almost 75 percent of canadians have had at least one dose of vaccine is a testament to the millions of vaccines that we have brought into the country to date. We will be closing out June with over 50 million vaccines in this country. And we are well on the way to having second doses delivered to Canadians. As of today, 31.6 million doses have been distributed to provinces and territories. So when we talk about numbers, I focus on what vaccines are coming into the country and in what volume are those vaccines coming into the country. strategy relating to providing as many Canadians as possible with the first dose is not within the procurement portfolio. But the numbers of vaccines that enable us to develop the strategy

relating to first doses and second doses surely is. And so I'm focused on just continuing to bring millions of vaccines into the country. Just today, we were able to announce that our negotiations with Moderna have led to them committing another 1.84 million vaccines coming to this country. So we're having 9.5 million vaccines this week alone. We had 9.5 million vaccines in the first quarter. So you can see, right, we have three months of 2021 with 9.5 million vaccines, which was very good, given that our target was six million vaccines but to see that same number coming in in one week that is a mark of an increased acceleration of vaccines coming into the country all right well listen you you certainly know your numbers and you certainly know where to place them but let me let me just pursue this a little bit on the first and

second dosing and I ask you this because you're also a member of the you know your your primary function of course is as procurement minister but you're also on the the main cabinet committee right in terms of of the kind of overall COVID strategy so I I just want to make sure I'm understanding you right are you saying that because of the success we're currently having, that this has proven that focusing on the first dose, getting it out there to as many people as possible, and now moving on the second dose, which is a departure from what a lot of other countries did.

But are you suggesting that that strategy is now proving to have been the right strategy well again peter my role is the minister of public services and procurement right so my role is to make sure we have vaccines in this country and i don't make the decisions relating to what the regimen is going to be for Canadians. In fact, those are provincial decisions that provinces are making relating to the distribution of vaccines. And of course, the NACI task force provides advice, does the public health agency of Canada. But my role is in no way related to what the dosing strategy is for Canadians. So if the numbers were, let's say, closer together, it wouldn't have made any difference to your position. Your position was still we got to get as many vaccines as possible get them into the country as quickly as we can exactly and i will say that my job isn't done until everybody

has who wants it has had two doses of vaccine that means that my job is to continue to bring in millions and millions of doses so that everybody can get two doses of vaccine. That's exactly what we're working towards. And based on current supply estimations, we'll have at least 80% of Canadians having two doses by the end of July. And our numbers are continually going up on the procurement side. So that's the goal, right? The two doses for everyone. And so resting on the one dose numbers is not enough. We have to keep going.

We've got a long road to travel and we need to finish this race. Let me back up to last year. Well, actually a little more than last year. When you first came into cabinet, you just won your first election as an mp and you're into cabinet you have this portfolio um public works and and procurement and on the procurement side i guess you were probably thinking when you're coming in okay ships airplanes that's what i'm going to be focused on and then suddenly boom pandemic hits and you're focused on, you know, masks and vaccines. And you're up against it a little bit because you're in a country that doesn't have its own production facility,

which I'm sure must have made the negotiation process a little harder than it might have been if there was one here. But can you take me to those earliest days of we've got to get vaccines? You know, nobody has one yet that's proven successful. There are any number of attempts of trying to come up with a successful vaccine. But what was it like? Because you had to go and negotiate anyway, even though nobody at that point had one. What was that like well certainly uh the task of operating as a minister of public services and procurement in the midst of an unprecedented global pandemic is not something that i expected

or i'm sure any minister expected but let me just set the frame of my feelings coming into the role as minister before turning to the vaccine negotiations themselves. So I had been a professor for almost 25 years. My role was to teach corporate and securities law and advanced securities law. And I wrote extensively about complex contracts and operating in the financial markets. So I came into cabinet in a role that required extensive knowledge of complex contracts. And I had not only practiced corporate law, but I had taught corporate law and securities law for almost 25 years. Had done a visitorship at the Bank of Canada and had been a visiting professor at Yale and Cambridge and had taught at Western and Queens. So the foundation was laid for me to be heavily ensconced in what was required of a minister of procurement in a pandemic. And when the pandemic hit, we immediately began to put into place

long-term contracts for PPE with a diverse range of suppliers, both domestic and international. We grew the domestic supply chains for PPE so that now over 40% of our PPE contracts by dollar value are with Canadian firms. And then turning to your second question on vaccines, it was an incredible time at the beginning of August last year, when all countries were competing to put into place contractual arrangements for vaccines that were not even discovered. These vaccines were in clinical trials and it would be months before stage three clinical trials were finished and regulatory approval would be granted. We were contracting on the basis of expectations alone. And of course, there is uncertainty in that environment.

As a result, we chose a strategy as a government and in procurement, which was to say, we will negotiate with seven suppliers. We will execute seven contracts because we don't know which horse is going to win this race. And that strategy of diversifying your portfolio, and as a former securities law prof, I talked a lot about diversification of portfolios with my students in terms of the capital markets but we diversified our vaccine portfolio so that we could uh hedge our risk so that we could ensure that whatever horse crossed the finish line we would have an option on that horse and then when when Pfizer and Moderna both declared efficacy rates of over 90%, we were extremely well placed to continue to draw down on those contractual arrangements.

But I will say that putting those contracts in place was only the first step in vaccine procurement. Because what we have had to do every step of the way to ensure vaccines get into this country is to continue the negotiations on the basis of the contract, to argue for Canada's position, to monitor their supply chains, to aggressively accelerate delivery dates from later quarters to earlier quarters in the year. So already to date, we've accelerated 28 million vaccines from later quarters to earlier quarters. And that's why our numbers are looking the way they do. And that's because we don't take our foot off the gas. We keep working the relationship to provide more and more vaccines to Canada. When you accelerate a contract like that, do you have to pay more?

In some circumstances, we have negotiated prices, but by and large, these are part of our contractual arrangements that suppliers bring vaccines forward on the basis of our negotiations. But every contract is different, Peter. And so I will simply say that the negotiations for aggressively moving up doses continue regardless, because the public health advice is that we need vaccines to see our way through this pandemic. So if the price goes up, the price goes up. The contracts will specify the prices if doses are moved up. Oh, I see. I understand.

It's not a negotiation that occurs at this time these are negotiations that already occurred at the time we contracted let me just ask this and i you know i'll be blunt do you what do you have on your side in a negotiation on these things because we need the vaccine we don't have any of the vaccine we're not making any of the vaccine how can you kind of bargain the price down or bargain the delivery schedule down are you not sort of in the position where you got to get what you can get you're raising a very very astute point and the point is that we're operating in a seller's market where every single country is clamoring for the exact same product. We saw this with N95 masks. We saw this with rapid tests at the beginning, and we are seeing this with vaccines. And when demand for a good like vaccines is so high, the ability to negotiate preferred terms is reduced.

Because, as you say, vaccine manufacturers can simply walk away and go to the next seller of a buyer that has a similar stipulations. Did that happen at all? Did you ever, were you ever confronted with that? Listen, I will say that notwithstanding that the government of Canada has a very sophisticated procurement team, and we were able to put on the table important clauses for us, including the deliveries, the exit clauses, and the stipulations relating to Health Canada approval of vaccines. And so there are abilities to continue to negotiate at the table. And I will say that there are some suppliers that really put Canada at the very top of their priority list in terms of our contracting. So we were the fourth country to sign with Pfizer in the world. We were one of

the first countries to sign with Moderna. And it was as a result of those relationships, we were able to negotiate to get those vaccines into our country earlier than most other countries, one of the first countries to begin inoculations in December. Johnson & Johnson only signed bilateral APAs with about eight or nine countries, and Canada was one of those countries. So our government and sophistication in contracting does have a preferred place among vaccine suppliers, generally speaking. But having said that, it is still a seller's market and the demand for vaccine is so high that we cannot for one minute take our eye off the prize which is why every day all day i am watching delivery schedules speaking with suppliers making sure planes are landing and goods

and vaccines are getting out to provinces and territories. Okay, I want to ask you a couple of questions about where your eye may occasionally glance over and look at as well as the procurement side, given your role on that central cabinet committee. One is the fear of the variants, especially the Delta variant. And we watched, even in Britain today, as the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, changed his mind about opening up and delaying things at least a month. Now, they're doing well, as you well know, on first and second doses. A lot of things are going right for them. But he's very worried.

And the big push is on for those who haven't been vaccinated to get vaccinated and second dose vaccinations. And it's all because of the Delta variant. So how concerned are you about the Delta variant? And how is it changing your approach? It sounds like you're pulling in vaccines from all over the place right now, which is pretty impressive. But how concerned are you about this variant and the impact it can have? Listen, I'm very concerned about the Delta variant, but I'm very concerned about COVID-19. Like COVID-19 has driven me to sleepless nights and working all day to get vaccines into this country.

And why? Because I have felt since the beginning of the pandemic that I'm running a race and it's a race to get PPE and a race to get rapid tests and a race to get vaccines into this country as soon as possible. Public health messaging tells us that we need to wear masks and we need to socially distance and we need to stay at home. That's not the focus of procurement though. The focus of procurement is to get the vaccines into the country so that in addition to those public health measures, we can make sure that Canadians are able to have access to vaccine. And that's why this second dose rollout is so, so important to make sure that the inoculations are occurring and quickly so that we can combat any variant, whether it's the Delta variant or anything else.

Well, you know, I raised the British example because certain things can make your job that much harder. And, you know, if they're worried about reopening, the British, you know, you've seen what's happening in Canada in different parts of the country, and I understand the difference between provincial and federal regulations and responsibilities, but places are opening up. And this, you know, that's only going to make your job harder, right? So Canada has taken a more prudent approach to opening up and indeed addressing the pandemic than many other countries.

And I think it's important to remember that one size doesn't fit all in terms of the approach to combating COVID-19. Canada in particular, very large geographical area, very strong provincial governments with specific role over healthcare and healthcare administration. We have to make sure that the approach that we are taking in our country is suitable for our country. So I tend not to look at what the other countries are doing as the reason for action in our country. I think we need to make specific choices about Canada based on the specific way in which the virus is taking hold in individual jurisdictions, recognizing the provincial authority in all of these areas.

All right, you've opened the door a little bit for me to ask something aside from how much vaccine to buy. Two particular areas I'd love your thought on. Vaccine resistance is one thing. And, you know, there are lots of different ways people are trying to convince those who are resisting. Hesitancy is another thing. And there's many different ways of trying to combat hesitancy. But resistance overall, like I'm not going to take a vaccine. That vaccine that's not illegal you know you can take that view if you want it's just like saying smoking's not illegal but smoking comes with a cost to the health system

right and doctors will argue some doctors will argue that not taking a vaccine is eventually going to be a problem for the healthcare system. Smokers have to pay a tax. That's the way they deliver on that responsibility of trying to help out because of something they do. Should there be some kind of tax on those who aren't willing to take a vaccine because they're going to impact the system if you believe in vaccines you believe that they're going to have an impact on the health care system so i'm not sure what you mean by the word tax but i will say that the consequences of not taking the vaccine are going to be felt, I believe, by individuals, given that employers and educational institutions and other organizations such as shopping malls will make decisions about what they need to put into place to reopen. Already we're seeing universities stipulate that returning students need to be

vaccinated. And so I think that in large part, the individual organizations are going to be deciding for themselves what is needed in order for public health and students and one hand and opening up an economy and a society and allowing people to have individual choice over what they wish to do with their own bodies on the other. All right. I hear you on that and the responsibility of individual private businesses and could be concerts, could be sports games whatever although governments could enter into this too in terms of travel and you've heard the discussion around vaccine certificates of some kind some call them vaccine passports and government occasionally says something one way or

the other on on that topic and i would would love to know how you feel about that. I mean, should people have to show some declaration, say when they're getting on an airplane or on the train or on public transit or whatever it may be, that they've had a vaccine or they're now fully vaccinated? Let me just make sure that I am clear that, A, we are seeing an incredible amount of demand from Canadians for vaccine. Our steep curve towards 75% of Canadians with at least one dose is evidence of increasing demand. Our continued calls from Canadians for vaccine that because they want their second dose, again, indicative of high demand. So in terms of vaccine hesitancy across the board in this country, it is much lower than other countries are seeing. And the first dose

numbers is just the, I would say, support think that we are going to see more and more stipulations for Canadians to show evidence of vaccination. But the choice at the end of the day will be within the individual, as I think it should be, to make a decision about what is best for them. And I think, again, this is a very difficult balance to strike, especially in a society that is democratic. But by the same token, we have come through one of the most difficult periods in our country's history. And the choice relating to what must be shown in order to travel, for example, really is one about allowing an economy and a society to function with some degree of normalcy well you very expertly kind of deflected the actual question in terms of whether government should actually enforce something like that i understand your whole issue about personal choice on certain matters in regards to this but you know governments have a responsibility for the safety of the public.

And one of the concerns is that, especially on air travel, but not only on air travel, that some form of identification showing government approved identification, showing what vaccinations they've had is something that should be considered do you think it should be i want to say that the important point that i am focused on as the minister of procurement is to bring vaccines in by the millions. And I do that because our government is focused on protecting Canadians and providing the supplies that they need in order to keep themselves safe. In terms of documentation, that is a conversation that our government is having,

that is under the purview of the minister of health and i am obviously supporting her in the purchase of all the items that she is requesting me to purchase in order to supply the provinces and territories with whom she deals with those supplies and so we our government will have more to say on documentation etc it is still a conversation that we are having uh across across the government well must be a vigorous conversation i'm sure around that cabinet table on this issue one last question um and i in some ways it relates back to to what what the brit Prime Minister said today. Because at one point he said, this virus is never going to die. And we're going to have to learn to live with this.

It's not going away. I mean, you've seen this whole story unfold over the last 16 months from a very particular vantage point. But that would seem to indicate that your job and those who follow you in that role, that job will never end. There's always going to be something in terms of vaccines or boosters or what have you on COVID.

Do you see it that way? Well, I'm actually really glad you asked that, Peter, because we haven't talked about the long term. And we need to talk about the long term. Because I think it is accurate to say that we will likely be battling some form of this pandemic, if not this one, another one at some point in our lives. And planning for the long term has been very important for me as well. So in the first instance, I'm focused on bringing vaccines by the millions into this country on a weekly basis. I've already reviewed the numbers with you, so I don't need to do that again. But in the second instance, I'm saying to myself, what do we need to keep Canadians safe next year and the year after and the year after? Do we need boosters? Do we need enhanced versions of existing vaccines? is our contractual makeup going to be to allow us to purchase these items next year and the year

after? And so what I have been doing with my department is putting in place contracts and entering into negotiations for boosters and additional vaccines so that we are well placed if this situation comes to pass where we need these levels of inoculation. One example of this planning is our recent contract with Pfizer Pfizer for 65 million doses over 2022 and 2023 of a variety of sort of vaccines, depending on what the needs of the country are at the time and what Pfizer has applied to Health Canada for. And so, again, we need to put in place the contractual arrangements that provide Canadians with the supports they need in the short and the long term. And if you were to say, you know, what has your role been? I would step back and say that is what my role has been. short and long-term contracts to provide incredibly important supplies and vaccines for the health and safety of Canadians. And, you know, we brought in 2.7 billion items

of PPE were contracted for that number and 1.5 billion or more are already in the country. So this is the work of procurement. We do contracts. And so I'm always saying to my team in procurement, let's focus on the contract. What is the goal for Canada in this contract and how can we deliver the most for canadians in a very effective and cost-effective manner and so that is what i bring to the table in procurement and i'm very pleased to have done it and i i have a lot more work to do but i've enjoyed it and feel privileged to be able to do it. Well, we feel privileged to have had the opportunity to talk to you about all this today. So, you know, I thank you for your availability and I wish you luck. I mean, I guess the only one quick little thing.

I mean, you have to buy. Remember when the crush was on about ventilators when all this started? Everybody wanted ventilators and Canada bought like thousands of them, right? 30 or 40,000 ventilators. Did we need them? Do we still have them? What did we do with them? So the contracts for ventilators were extremely important for the country at the beginning of the pandemic when the world was clamoring for ventilators. And again, we did not have domestic production of ventilators. And so my colleague Nav Beans in ISET, the department that deals with economic development, and I worked on ensuring that Canada was prepared for any eventuality, that we would have the supply of ventilators in place,

and that Canadian industry would be able to participate in the provision of these ventilators. So already we've received 27,000 ventilators. We sent some of those ventilators to India during the height of its third wave. And so we are very honored to have worked with Canadian industry to build up the expertise in terms of ventilators here. We needed to respond to the pandemic. We needed domestic capacity, not just in ventilators, but in N95 masks, for example. Do you remember the N95s from 3M that weren't able initially to cross the border? We had to negotiate very, very aggressively to get

those N95s into the country, which we did. But we knew that we needed Canadian manufacturing. So Medicom in Quebec, and we set up a 3M plant with 3M and the Ontario government in Brockville, so that never again will we have to worry that shipments from another jurisdiction are unable to come to Canada when we need N95s. So this is the task of procurement and I said is to work with Canadian industry to make sure we've contracts in place to provide these goods for the health and safety of our frontline health care workers and patients who are in the ICU and need these products. Thank you for that.

I always wondered what happened to all of those, but that's an answer that answers those questions, so I appreciate it. And I really appreciate your time. I know you're extremely busy, and it was very of you to to allow me some time for this today no problem anytime it's a really real pleasure to be here with you and to chat with you so thank you for having me thank you anita anon the minister of Public Services and Procurement. And we're going to have to procure a new microphone for the minister.

She was at home. You heard her dog barking at one part. But we've got to get her a better mic because the bees are popping, as they say in our business. But nevertheless, I found it really interesting and revealing from the basics of the kind of weak position we were in as a country at the beginning of all this and what was needed and the fact that we didn't have any production of our own on most of those things to the point we're at now.

And it's debatable where we are exactly right now, but you can tell in the confidence of the minister where exactly she feels. Okay, we're going to take a fast break. Be back in a moment to wrap things up. All right, back on the bridge for a Tuesday. You could be listening on SiriusXM, Channel 167 Canada Talks, or you could be listening on whatever podcast platform that you use. However you're listening, it's good to have you with us. Now, if you have comments, as I'm sure some of you do,

on Minister Anand's interview today on the bridge, don't be shy. The Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com. The Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com. Love to hear from you. Fridays is the day that we put all the mailbag together on the weekend special. But get your thoughts in, as I said. It would be great to hear from you on that.

Tomorrow, it's Smoke Mirrors and the Truth with Bruce Anderson, the radish farmer. And we need a radish update. People are demanding a radish update. So we'll get that from Bruce tomorrow. Listen, thanks for listening today. I'm Peter Mansbridge. This has been The Bridge. We'll talk to you again in 24 hours. Thank you.