OTTAWA - Critics are calling on Health Minister Tony Clement to fix what they say are glaring omissions to a blue-ribbon panel on human reproduction.
Liberal health critic Ruby Dhalla and former Liberal public health minister Carolyn Bennett say the most obvious omission to the agency is patient representation - people trying to have children.
They also want members of the panel, known as the Assisted Human Reproduction Agency, to include a fertility specialist or fertility nurse, ethicists, fertility counsellors and stem-cell scientists.
Dhalla says the agency is stacked with people who are biased against reproductive technology and who lack experience in what is a complex and emotional issue.
In March 2004, legislation was passed to create the agency, which can have up to 13 appointments.
The government filled 10 of those spaces just before Christmas.
