Health committee  Madam Chair, in response, generally that is the behaviour of all insurance companies. They often want to make sure they are reimbursing valid bills. The advice we have with respect to privacy is this. When people seek reimbursement from our program, they obviously give us the right to inquire that the payments we're making on their behalf are legitimate.

Health committee  Madam Chairman, I'd be pleased to answer. First Canadian Health monitors and administers the benefits, and it has established an online computerized system that interacts with all the pharmacies. When a client approaches with a prescription, the system allows the pharmacist to enter that prescription.

Health committee  We do two things. We review First Canadian Health, the bills they send us, and determine whether First Canadian Health are actually remitting to us a valid bill from a dentist or a pharmacist. First Canadian Health acts on our behalf and they send auditors in—these are usually contract people—to a selected group of pharmacies or dentists or other providers.

Health committee  Yes, it would be me.

Health committee  I will get the details to the committee, but the company is owned by the Tribal Councils Investment Group of Manitoba, which is made up of I think seven tribal councils in Manitoba. So it's not any particular individual. If the committee is interested in who makes up the board of directors of that company, we could get that information and table it with the committee.

Health committee  Yes, I could just add that with the provisions we've now put in place--and I'm pleased the Auditor General has recognized that we now meet our obligations under sections 33 and 34—they are a much more rigorous process. What we have with the contractor is they submit to us a bill for their services, which is the payment processing, plus the bills they refund to the providers.

Public Accounts committee  The life expectancy for a registered Indian is 68.9 years as compared with the life expectancy for other Canadians, so the gap is 7.4 years. The life expectancy for a female is 76.6 years, as opposed to 81.8 for the average Canadian. The gap there is 5.2 years.

Public Accounts committee  I would just indicate that we did an analysis of the number of clients who had 50 claims. It showed that there were actually 50 claims in our system. But no clients are receiving 50 prescriptions in a 90-day period--none. What we then did was look at the clients to find out whether these clients were at risk.

Public Accounts committee  No, that's for everyone. We look at all of the people who receive drugs that we pay for. The issue you referred to, Mr. Williams, is a reference to collecting information on people who die due to the overdose or misuse of prescription drugs.

Public Accounts committee  We have tried to get that information. We approached the provinces and we have renewed our efforts. We have recently written to each one of the provinces' regulatory authorities because all of the information with respect to deaths is not in our hands. They all reside with the authorities that deal with vital statistics and death records.

Public Accounts committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. As Madam Gosselin said, we have followed up on the recommendations of the Auditor General and of this committee. We have put in place a drug utilization review regime that had three components. There is a prospective component that controls the formula in the drugs that we pay for, and we've done a number of things.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There may be a couple that don't, but 99.9% submit that way. We are moving the dental benefits to be the same, so it's all going to be Internet-based.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm not quite sure I understand the question fully. I will try to answer it. If I haven't quite answered it, maybe you could just tell me where I'm wrong. The process we have for submitting pharmacy bills is automatic. It's an Internet-based system, so when a client goes to the pharmacy, the pharmacy automatically enters it into an Internet system--

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Some are and some aren't. Our plan is to have it all in there as fast as we can. While almost every pharmacy in Canada has an Internet connection and is capable of dealing with that, some dental offices haven't gone that way. But most claims are being submitted that way. In terms of paying, we're running a system that runs quite quickly.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm pleased to answer that. The issue that was raised with you by the Canadian Dental Association has been resolved, in that the $800 cap has been removed. It was removed in July 2005. So we no longer have a financial limit on pre-approvals. Like almost every dental plan, there are some procedures that do require pre-approval, but there is no financial limit any more.