Quebec confirms appointment of Dr Luc Boileau as National Director of Public Health. He had held this position on an interim basis since January after replacing his predecessor, the Dr Horacio Arruda.
Posted at 5:54 p.m.
Updated at 6:28 p.m.
Luc Boileau will therefore occupy this position in addition to that of assistant deputy minister at the Ministry of Health and Social Services, starting June 16, the office of Prime Minister François Legault confirmed on Wednesday.
Recall that he had taken the place of the Dr Horacio Arruda after 22 months of the pandemic, when the Legault government came under heavy criticism for its management of the fifth wave of COVID-19.
It is Michèle de Guise who will take over from June 16 at the head of the National Institute of Excellence in Health and Social Services (INESS) as President and Chief Executive Officer, a position she also already held. acting The position of president of the Institut national de santé publique du Québec (INSPQ) will go to Pierre-Gerlier Forest, full professor of community health sciences at the University of Calgary, who will begin his new term on July 4.
In Quebec, the national director of public health is also assistant deputy minister of health. The existence of these “two hats” has, however, been the subject of criticism in the past year. Pleading for total independence of the national director of public health vis-à-vis politics, several voices, including the College of Physicians of Quebec, have risen to demand an overhaul of the function.
Luc Boileau was President of the Montérégie Health and Social Services Agency from 1993 to 2008. He was then President of INSPQ from 2008 to 2015. Then he was President of INESS from 2015 until in January 2022.