Page - 97 - in VULNERABLE - The Law, Policy and Ethics of COVID-19

97Pandemic Data Sharing: How the Canadian Constitution Has Turned into a Suicide Pact SARS presented different challenges than the Spanish Flu. Not only was it extremely dangerous, with a case fatality rate over 10%, but this time the World Health Organization (WHO) demanded epi- demiological data from Canada about the scope of the epidemic, par- ticularly in Toronto. Canada had no way to fulfil this demand, because a jurisdic- tional fight broke out and Ontario refused to share its epidemiologi- cal data with Health Canada. So little sharing occurred that Health Canada had to glean data from Ontario’s press conferences!10 This left Health Canada in no position to answer WHO, which grew afraid that Canada was concealing epidemiological data—which it was, via immature federal-provincial squabbling. WHO therefore recom- mended against travelling to Toronto, making Canada one of only two countries ever to face that sanction (the other was notoriously secretive China).11 Later, Ontario established a SARS commission of inquiry to probe the causes of WHO’s sanction.12 In a blistering report, Justice Archie Campbell found that a jurisdictional battle between Ontario and Ottawa got in the way, and exhibited little judicial restraint in warning about the consequences: If a greater spirit of federal-provincial cooperation is not forth- coming in respect of public health protection, Ontario and the rest of Canada will be at greater risk from infectious disease and will look like fools in the international community.13 Justice Campbell also reviewed three other federal and provincial investigations into SARS—it was a cottage industry—and concluded that “one thing [is] crystal clear: the greatest benefit from new public 10. National Advisory Committee on SARS and Public Health, “Learning from SARS: Renewal of Public Health in Canada” (2003) at 202, online (pdf): Health Canada <https://www.canada.ca/content/dam/phac-aspc/migration/phac-aspc/ publicat/sars-sras/pdf/sars-e.pdf>. 11. World Health Organization, “WHO Extends its SARS-Related Travel Advice to Beijing and Shanxi Province in China and to Toronto, Canada” (23 April 2003), online: World  Health  Organization <https://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/ notes/2003/np7/en/>. 12. Government of Ontario, The SARS Commission, The SARS Commission Report, vol 1 (Toronto: The SARS Commission, December 2006) (The Honourable Justice Archie Campbell), online (pdf): The Archives of Ontario <http://www. archives.gov.on.ca/en/e_records/sars/report/index.html>. 13. Ibid at 193, vol 4.