This story is part of the second opinion of CBC Health, a weekly analysis of health and medical sciences sent by email to subscribers on Saturday morning. If you haven’t subscribed yet, you can do it by click here.
Many best scientists in the United States are now unemployed.
The Secretary of Health, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., aims to reduce 20,000 jobs in agencies such as Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Not all of them are scientists, but Canada may have a role to play in ensuring that American scientists are able to continue their research, say researchers on both sides of the border.
Year, Canadian academics say they hear American colleagues daily looking for job possibilities in Canada.
An example: Dr. Madhukar Pai, director of McGill’s global health programs, told CBC News that he expected a record number of candidates for a new job permanently in his department, opening in the coming weeks. It is a particularly hard -hit field in the middle scanning cuts To the American Agency for International Development which reduces programs to safeguard lives around the world to combat diseases such as HIV and malaria.
Scientists supervising cancer research, vaccines and drug approvals, public health and tobacco regulations are also part of 10,000 people already dismissed. Public health experts say that mass layoffs may have catastrophic impacts for the United States and the world.
“Some of the best public health experts in the world have just lost their jobs,” said former CDC director, Dr. Tom Frieden.
Without the CDC, more people will fall sick with infectious diseases and potentially die in the United States and worldwide-including Canada, he said. “There are risks for Canada – and the possibilities for Canada to intensify.”
Kevin Griffis, a former CDC communications director, resigned to protest two weeks ago after three years at the agency. He said mass shots were largely felt and could have had unforeseen consequences.
If the agency was to hold a press conference today on a major threat in public health, “there is no one who even knows how to manage the sound. Because they dismissed the studio team,” he said.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr, a vaccination critic that is committed to combating chronic diseases, was appointed American secretary of health on Thursday after overcoming the resistance of the medical establishment and members of the congress with promises to limit its role in the vaccination policy. Dr. Joss Reimer, president of the Canadian medical association, said that “disinformation does not respect borders”, adding that any disinformation is very worrying.
Research discounts in the United States will also create gaps in evidence because there will be less research funded and carried out overall, explains Kirsten Patrick, editor-in-chief of the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ). This is why it is all the more important that Canada intensifies its research funding, she said.
“If we have a situation where, in the south, research is not as well funded as it should be and that some research is not even done, then we must have a solid research system in Canada,” she said.
The provinces “deploy the welcome carpet”
The Canadian provinces are already trying to suddenly attract American health experts.
The Manitoba “deploys the welcome carpet” for us, doctors, nurses and researchers trained by us, said Minister of Health Uzoma Asagwara in a press release at CBC.
The province is currently talking about more than a dozen doctors in the United States who wish to move, said Asagwara.
They are also developing a “complete American recruitment campaign in the coming weeks”.
British Columbia also says that it had an eye on the latest developments in the United States, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Health, said in a statement that he “would provide what support (he) can” “to American colleagues, so that they can continue their crucial work. British Columbia also actively recruits health professionals.
In Toronto, University Health Network should also announce its strategy to attract the best scientists on Monday.
But other groups are also trying to recruit the same scientists: Frieden, the former director of the CDC, has already extended an offer to a scientist from the government dismissed for the non -profit organization he is now directing, decides to save lives.
In the United States, local and state governments are also trying to cling Federal workers dismissed – not to mention universities around the world.
Canada well positioned to compete
But Canada is well positioned among competition. We have already struck our weight with regard to research, explains Stephanie Michaud, CEO of Biocanrx, a research network which focuses on the development of immune therapies to fight cancer. He received 40 million dollars in federal funding between 2015 and 2019 – and $ 109.5 million in funding from others, such as industry partners, provinces and charitable organizations.
“We have excellent researchers and excellent clinicians who are already working here,” she said, stressing that Canadian researchers tend to publish prolific.
Where Canada could do better, she says, is to translate the treatments into treatment through clinical trials and, possibly, to practice.
“What is needed in terms of investments to obtain a discovery that has been found, published in a Canadian laboratory and taking it to a clinical trial. This is where Canada (A) (A) (a) said,” she said.
While American scientists are looking at other countries to continue their work, this is an opportunity for Canada to tackle this weakness, listening to scientists and clinicians and investing in more research – which makes Canada more attractive for the best talents.
Canada finances much less research than the United States per capita, according to analysis of the Canadian Association for Neuroscience. From 2020 to 2021, the NIH financed around 55.7 billion CDN dollars in research. Canadian Health Research Institutes, in comparison, financed $ 1.44 billion. Even since the American population is about nine times larger than that of Canada, it is a difference of 39 times.
“I think we have all the right ingredients, we just need to bring all the parts together,” said Michaud.
Increase in research financing
Another strategy that Canada could adopt: facilitating researchers in Canada to keep the lights in their laboratories, explains Dr. William Ghali, vice-president of research at Calgary University.
In Canada, if a researcher obtains a federal subsidy, the government also puts aside money to cover costs such as hiring support staff, exploitation and maintenance of laboratories or payment of IT / data servers.
But it is paid to universities each year, without attachment to all individual researchers or subsidies – and it is not enough money in the end to cover the costs of everything that makes research possible, according to Ghali.
Ghali says it’s a good time for Canada to reconsider our approach. He says that these indirect costs make a huge difference for researchers – and guaranteeing good indirect funding will attract the best talents from outside Canada.
This, in turn, will benefit all Canadians, he says: Scientific growth leads to economic growth.
A research partnership, has changed
But underlying the feeling of opportunity, there is also sorrow.
But scientists leave the United States because it does not feel safe or supported in their country is sad, according to Ghali, who says that it looks like a blow against global cooperation.
Dr. Pai, director of McGill’s global health programs, says that he feels uncomfortable with the idea of poaching American scientists.
“American scientists deserve to work in their own country, not to leave their families, to feel safe in their own country, to be adequate (and) respected and rewarded,” he wrote on Bluesky.
But this is a new reality with which the world counts: the United States cannot be dependent to fulfill the role it has played for decades. This is a lesson that economists learn as a result of the prices of the “Liberation Day”. Scientists warn that the same lesson expects health and medical research.
“It is possible for Canada to reshape its global partnerships, perhaps earning closer links with Europe, perhaps becoming stronger in terms of cohesion in Canada,” said Ghali.