Federal officials are continuing to spend millions managing and disposing of expired pandemic supplies, with storage costs alone reaching $17 million since the global health emergency officially ended in 2023.New records show the Public Health Agency of Canada is still working through tens of millions of expired masks, gloves and other personal protective equipment left over from the COVID-19 response, even as it attempts to reduce the stockpile.“In response to the COVID-19 pandemic the Public Health Agency procured more than 4,000,000,000 units of medical countermeasures,” the agency said in an Inquiry of Ministry tabled in the House of Commons. More than two billion units were distributed before demand dropped off sharply.The remaining supplies were placed in warehouses as part of the National Emergency Strategic Stockpile, with the agency now attempting to “divest itself of remaining surplus assets.”As of Dec. 22, officials reported 63,998,450 expired items, including masks, respirators, gowns and face shields. By Jan. 31, that number had dropped to about 21 million units as recycling and disposal efforts continued, though the agency said totals will fluctuate.The figures were released in response to Conservative MP Dave Epp (Chatham-Kent, Ont.), who asked what it cost taxpayers to store unusable equipment..The agency has not provided a full accounting of pandemic-related waste, and no parliamentary committee has compiled total costs tied to procurement and storage decisions during COVID-19.In a 2024 internal report, the agency acknowledged it was “not as prepared as it could have been” despite earlier assurances to government and the public.At the outset of the pandemic, then-prime minister Justin Trudeau said Canada was among the best-prepared countries in the world. However, documents later showed the agency had ignored a 2011 evaluation recommending it maintain larger emergency reserves and had disposed of 8.8 million masks prior to COVID-19 to save about $900,000 annually in storage costs.Testifying before a Commons committee in 2020, agency executive Sally Thornton said the decision to reduce stockpiles was not driven by budget cuts..“It was not actually related to specific budget cuts,” she said. “No, it was not driven by specific cuts.”Records also show the agency hired Ottawa-based consultant CPCS Transcom Limited to review storage operations and identify efficiencies. The review recommended reducing the number of warehouses from nine to six, a move expected to save $900,000 while maintaining response capacity.Despite those changes, the federal government continues to manage millions of expired supplies, highlighting ongoing costs tied to pandemic-era procurement decisions.
