Ontario government announces members of its COVID-19 vaccine panel

TORONTO — The Ontario government has appointed nine people to its new COVID-19 vaccine panel, including the province’s top coroner.

The panel, headed by retired chief of national defence staff Gen. Rick Hillier, will oversee distribution of the vaccine when available.

Health Minister Christine Elliott says it will up to the panel to ensure effective and ethical delivery of a vaccine.

Key tasks include delivery, logistics and administration, clinical guidance as well as public education and outreach.

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Here are the following people on Ontario’s COVID-19 distribution task force:

• Dr. Dirk Huyer — Ontario’s Chief Coroner and Coordinator of Provincial Outbreak Response
• Dr. Homer Tien — trauma surgeon and President and CEO of Ornge
• Dr. Maxwell Smith — bioethicist and assistant professor at Western University
• Dr. Isaac Bogoch — infectious diseases consultant and internist at Toronto General Hospital
• Ontario Regional Chief RoseAnne Archibald of Taykwa Tagamou Nation
• Dr. Regis Vaillancourt — Director of Pharmacy and Integrated Pain Services, Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario
• Linda Hasenfratz — CEO of Linamar Corporation
• Angela Mondou — President and CEO of TECHNATION
• Mark Saunders — former Toronto Police Chief

— With files from Global News Gabby Rodrigues.

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