Excerpts from the President's Speech Launching CIHR

We are launching today a bold new initiative - the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. It is a great honour and exciting challenge for me to be asked to serve as the inaugural President of CIHR, to be at the centre of this defining moment in health research.

With today's launch of CIHR, we are creating a health research enterprise that is an entirely new way of conducting health research, one that will harness the scientific excellence of Canadians across the full spectrum of health research, to improve the health of Canadians and of people throughout the world.

CIHR will be the underpinnings of the Canadian health care system and the driver that is fueling the evolution of Canada's knowledge-based economy.

CIHR has been eagerly anticipated by the health research community and so our immediate goal is to ensure that CIHR's first 100 days are truly memorable.

CIHR will strengthen Canada's health care system and improve the health of individual Canadians through its support of research excellence and the creation of new scientific knowledge. It will ensure that this knowledge informs the development of new therapies, cures and prevention strategies to enhance our health.

CIHR will also enable legislators, health and social science professionals, policy makers and individual Canadians to link scientific evidence to decision making within the health care system. It will support research on economic, ethical, social and cultural issues as they pertain to health, ensuring that the broadest and most inclusive perspectives are brought to focus on the health of Canadians.

Partnerships are integral to the CIHR vision and we will be working closely with all those involved in the health research process, including funders in government, the voluntary health sector, researchers, industry, and communities.

This new investment in health research will also fuel the evolution of the Canadian economy in the 21st century towards a knowledge-based economy creating highly skilled jobs that will be contributing to improved human health.

By the end of our first 100 days, the Governing Council will have selected the slate of Institutes that will comprise CIHR, recruited Scientific Directors for each Institute, and named the Institute Advisory Boards that will provide guidance to the Institute Directors.

We all owe a debt of gratitude to the members of the Interim Governing Council, in particular Dr. Henry Friesen, Dorothy Lamont, and Eric Maldoff, for their leadership and vision and the great legacy they have left to the country in bringing CIHR to this stage. We are building on the invaluable contributions, not only of the IGC, but of the entire Canadian health research community, the provinces, the voluntary health sector and all those who responded to the challenge of designing a full range of possible CIHR Institutes.

By this fall, Institutes will be fully operational. They will be virtual Institutes, bringing together investigators from across Canada and across the complete spectrum of health research. CIHR is not about bricks and mortar, it is not about building walls, it is about opening doors.

Our challenge is a mandate that goes far beyond that ever given to a federal granting council. We are embarking on an entirely new way to carry out health research, a bold new approach that is being watched with great interest by countries around the world.

Canadian investigators have been at the forefront of the revolution that is now enveloping all of health research. This year alone, Canadian scientists have announced important advances in cancer research, diabetes, the neurosciences, the relationship between socioeconomic status and outcomes after a heart attack, and have produced the first comprehensive snapshot of the health of Canada's health care system.

The creation of new knowledge is not a straight line but a circuitous journey into the unknown. We must enable outstanding researchers to follow their curiosity into new and unforseen directions, and ensure that fundamental research is supported at internationally competitive levels.

I know that researchers across the country want to coordinate their research efforts in a strategic way that positions Canada to the greatest advantage in this great global adventure of discovery. I invite all Canadians to join us.

If you have any comments or questions about CIHR and/or health research in Canada, please e-mail me at abernstein@cihr-irsc.gc.ca