Health Canada is hoping to use private-sector dollars to fight opioid addiction because “conventional efforts are not enough” to address the national health crisis, newly released documents reveal.
For months, the department has been quietly considering a pay-for-performance project to see if specific help targeted at a small group of opioid addicts reduces their dependence on the drug, improves their health and, above all, reduces deaths from overdoses.
What makes the effort unique is that officials are looking at having private backers take on the financial risk to fund the experiment, which is estimated to cost more than $4 million, with federal coffers to pay out only if the work produces measurable success.
The results of a study filling in details on the actual work and costs, as well as the level of private-sector interest in bankrolling the project, were delivered to Health Canada last week.
If federal officials give the plan a go-ahead — a decision that has yet to be made — it would be a rare moment when a social-impact bond, as the financing model is known, is used to pay for a health-related research project.
Social-impact bonds have helped fund about 20 health-related projects worldwide, including in Canada and the United States, officials wrote in one briefing note among almost 130 pages of documents obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act.
What makes the bonds appealing to governments is that they require a service provider, usually a non-profit, to get funding from private investors with the help of a broker.
The government pays out only if certain benchmarks are met — meaning investors can earn back their investment plus a profit depending on the amount of risk in a project, the non-profits find new sources of funding beyond limited government dollars, and governments push the financial risk off their books.
The federal Liberals, like the Conservatives before them, have shown a keen interest in the bonds and the larger concept of social financing, putting hundreds of millions into a fund designed to spur growth in the sector as part of a wider strategy. Overseeing the strategy and the fund will be an advisory council, which has an application deadline of Sept. 13.
