Some days it really does feel like Canada has farmed out its entire health policy during this COVID-19 crisis to the World Health Organization.

From the early days, answers to questions on testing, on the spread of the virus, on approving treatments or even rapid testing, have been to cite what the WHO recommends.

That is nothing short of a dereliction of duty by Canadas top health officials.

The latest example is the decision of Health Canada not to approve a cheap and rapid test for COVID-19, one made right here in Canada, because of what the WHO says. BTNX Inc. of Markham, Ont. makes a test that can have results in 15 minutes and costs just $10 a piece.

The test cant be used for early detection but can confirm COVID-19 for people who have been showing symptoms for several days. It also tests for anti-bodies to determine if someone has already had the disease and therefore is possibly immune.

Despite the sale of this test kit in the U.S., the U.K. and across Europe, Health Canada turned the company down this past week. As CBC reported, the company was rejected by Health Canada over the advice given by the WHO.

In an email to CBC News, Health Canada said it is following the advice of the World Health Organization, which does not currently recommend serological (blood) tests for clinical diagnosis, CBC reported on Sunday.

Let me get this straight: We have a company that can provide accurate results using a blood test and we wont use it because an international body in Geneva says no?

Can you imagine that being the case when Banting and Best discovered how to extract insulin and treat diabetics at their University of Toronto lab? Or the invention of Pablum to fight off malnutrition in the 1930s?

Would Canadian doctors and researchers have had breakthroughs in open heart surgery, stem cell transplants, vaccines for childhood diseases, gene therapies, treatments for stroke, cystic fibrosis, HIV and more if we had to simply follow WHO guidelines?

No, in fact, following the rules of a bureaucratic organization like the WHO is the opposite of what researchers do.

Im not for a moment advocating that Canada should ignore the WHO, should play no part in it. The WHO has a role to play but that role is not in setting health policy for Canada.

Were we a less developed country with a less robust medical system, without more than a century of continuously evolving medical research, then perhaps listening to the WHO first and following their advice would make sense. For Canada it does not, it slows things down, it stops innovation.

Could and should Canada be working in coordination with the WHO? Sure, but not following their orders. This is an organization that has already been shown to have been slow off the mark by believing misinformation from the Chinese government at the start of this outbreak.

Sadly, though, whether the answers have come from Health Canada bureaucrats, the chief medical officer, the health minister or the prime minister, too often what Canadians have been told is a series of WHO talking points.

Canada has the medical ingenuity, the depth of research and the quality of doctors needed to chart our own path that at times will follow the WHO and at other times diverge. When time is of the essence in finding better ways to test, better ways to treat and better ways to counter the spread of this virus, Ill take Canadian doctors over a United Nations body in far off Geneva any day.

Lets hope the Trudeau government starts realizing that they should trust and champion Canadas medical community as well.

blilley@postmedia.com

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LILLEY: Trudeau government needs to stop taking COVID orders from WHO - Toronto Sun