The federal health minister said he would seek more COVID-19 vaccination data sharing from provinces, but his department says it’s not interested in obtaining personal-level details on the vaccination status of Canadians.
“While the Public Health Agency of Canada [PHAC] is interested in vaccine uptake and coverage in Canada, the information the agency receives from provinces and territories is devoid of all personal information,” Health Canada spokesperson Charmaine Sleiman told The Epoch Times.
“PHAC is not interested in receiving personal-level information on the vaccination status of Canadians.”
In December, after the auditor general released its report on Ottawa’s management of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign and while the federal and provincial governments were being pressed to address the healthcare crisis, Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos made a number of comments on the issue of the sharing of health data.
The report identified data-sharing problems relating to vaccine surveillance at PHAC that were raised in previous audits.
“In the 2021 audit, we reported that the agency did not have regulations for the collection, use, and disclosure of public health information and that it had not finalized with its provincial and territorial partners which elements of health information should be provided, to whom, and in what format,” says the report.
It added the issue was still present in the 2022 audit and this affected PHAC’s sharing of “detailed case-level safety surveillance data with Health Canada, as well as with the World Health Organization and vaccine companies.”
On the PCHDS, Health Canada Spokesperson Sleiman says it doesn’t seek to “to create a national data collection program or technology system or platform.”
“Rather it would facilitate the creation of a new, interoperable enabling environment to support the creation of a world-class health data system.”
Duclos said in a press conference on Dec. 14 that having provinces agree to a deal on health data sharing was one of “two big pieces” to have the discussion on health transfers go forward with the provincial premiers.
“There were two key plans, one on supporting health workers, and one on modernizing our health system, including having a modern health data system in Canada. We were prepared to approve those plans and to make them public but we were asked by premiers not to do so,” Duclos said about a meeting with provincial health ministers held in early November.
The minister said Canada’s health data sharing is not adequate and could put lives in danger.
“When people arrive at the emergency and the doctor is not able to know whether these people have been vaccinated, what medicine they’re taking, what recent tests they took, it puts in jeopardy the quality and sometimes the safety of the care they receive,” he said in French.
The mention of the vaccination status of patients in the context of the federal government’s intent to obtain data from provinces raised the question as to what exactly Health Canada is seeking to obtain.
Sleiman says PHAC is “seeking to improve the sharing of aggregate vaccination data based on standardized/harmonized data fields, in order to allow comparability and consistency.”
The agency says it is also working with provinces and territories on strategies to share data on vaccine coverage across the country.
