Canada’s health security depends on increased support for high-risk, high-reward scientific research

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the fact that Canada lacks biopharmaceutical and vaccine manufacturing capacity. At the same time, it has highlighted Canada’s strengths in biopharmaceutical innovation. A critical component of the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine —and one of the first therapeutic antibodies to treat SARS-CoV-2 infected patients—were developed in Canada. Canada’s biomedical community can clearly be competitive globally. However, we need investment in research and development, as well as infrastructure, to enable end-to-end, made-in-Canada solutions that can help Canadians and ensure health security. The pandemic threatens not only our health, but the economic foundations of our country, and the risk of societal breakdown. We cannot compete with the vaccination rates of other developed countries because we lack access to domestic vaccine biomanufacturing as well as companies developing new vaccine technologies. We lack control over our pandemic response capability; and this endangers our national health security. Canada has woken up to the significance of this lack of biomanufacturing capacity. The Canadian government has stepped up to bolster this capability across the country to ensure a domestic vaccine supply later in 2021. But we must build domestic biomedical innovation to feed this new manufacturing infrastructure. Standalone biomanufacturing capacity without strong organizations focused on highly innovative discovery and research will not build a strong industry. With a focus primarily on biomanufacturing, we can build companies that resemble GM or Ford; if we add the innovation/R&D capacity, we could have companies like Tesla producing disruptive technologies and therapies. Biomanufacturing must be complemented by innovative R&D efforts that drive the need for such facilities. There’s a path forward to achieve this new ecosystem. First, the government must dramatically increase support for high-risk, high-reward research that supports the next generation of biomedical discoveries. Canada has been shuttering programs that are aimed at translating innovative academic discoveries into new medicines. There are few places to go for support of projects that require cross-disciplinary approaches, such as those that led to the first mRNA vaccines. Funding for cutting-edge biomedical research hubs would also develop the talent required to staff the evolving biopharmaceutical industry. Secondly, the government must lower the barriers to startup creation in the biomedical sector. Early-stage biomedical startup companies are very difficult to fund in Canada. In the U.S., more than half the seed capital used to start companies comes from government programs, including initiatives such as the Small Business Innovation Research program. A comparable program is needed in Canada to make it easier to launch startups. A growing constellation of small, young companies would create jobs and help Canada retain talent, as well as intellectual property. It will also attract investment and enhance the probability that these companies grow to become fully integrated “anchor” companies that produce the medicines of the future. Finally, the government must support made-in-Canada biopharmaceutical efforts. Provincial health ministries collectively spend approximately $200-billion a year; very little of that is directed towards research aimed at improved and more efficient ways of delivering healthcare. Precision medicine, which closely matches targeted therapies with subsets of patients based on genomic, proteomic and other molecular measurements, has transformative potential.Devoting one or two per cent of the health-care budget to source Canadian efforts to address these emerging trends, such as precision medicine, would reduce costs and dramatically amplify Canada’s worldwide impact in the biopharmaceutical arena. Canada has all the resources in place to become a leader in the global biomedical revolution. The booming biotech industry in places such as Boston, Austin, London, New York City, and the Bay Area is projected to produce unprecedented growth over the coming decade. In Canada, growing this industry would accelerate our transition to a knowledge-based economy, and provide new drivers of economic prosperity. It would also lead to the creation of high-value jobs and allow us to retain our talented scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs in Canada. Right now, more than fifty per cent of those who earn PhDs in life sciences at the University of Toronto leave Canada to begin their first job in biomedical research and development outside the country, according to internal data collected through a survey conducted by PRiME, an initiative from Precision Medicine. Often, this isn’t because they want to leave, but because they have to, given the lack of suitable jobs in Canada. Over the last year, our health, our lives and our economy have been dramatically upended by the widespread transmission of a new viral pathogen. We have spent over $400-billion to try to ameliorate the economic and societal effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. If we have learned one lesson, it is this: Ottawa must invest significantly in talent, research, and infrastructure to deal not only with the next pandemic, but also to enable Canada to become a leader in developing the medicines and the healthcare of the future. Our health, national security, and economy depend on it. Shana Kelley is a university professor at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Toronto and director of PRiME, a Precision Medicine initiative. Pieter Cullis is a professor at UBC’s department of biochemistry and molecular biology and scientific director and CEO, NanoMedicines Innovation Network. The Hill Times