Prime Minister Announces New Support For Covid-19 Medical Research

in Canada, Coronavirus April 23, 2020 0 355 Views

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau today announced new support for Canadian scientists and medical researchers who are working against time to develop vaccine for COVID-19.

“Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have been working closely with Canada’s health experts and researchers, who are some of the most skilled and brightest in the world. We are making sure that Canada remains at the forefront of scientific research to help us make smart and effective decisions on the path to recovery”, said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

The government dedicated $40 million to Genome Canada and CGEN to support their sequencing of 150,000 virus samples and 10,000 genomes, allowing them to better understand how COVID-19 works.

National Research Council is provided with $29 million to the Human Health Therapeutics Research Center facility in Montreal to produce vaccines for clinical trials and prepare vials for individual doses as soon as a vaccine becomes available.

Another $23 million added in support to the important work of the University of Saskatchewan’s Vaccine and Infectious Disease Center, to support pre-clinical testing and clinical trials of COVID-19 vaccine candidates.

$675,000 support is provided through the Stem Cell Network – Réseau de cellules souches to support research and clinical trials into cell therapy as a treatment for COVID-19.

Strategic Innovation Fund will get $600 million over two years to support large companies with promising vaccine and treatment candidates to move to clinical trials.

“We know that science is fundamental to beating COVID-19 and Canada is benefiting from the impressive and innovative power of Canadian researchers in our coordinated national approach to fight COVID-19. Together, we are rapidly scaling up our research capacity to harness genomic sequencing data to inform public health interventions and to advance a vaccine against COVID-19 to protect Canadians and end the crisis.” said Mr Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry.