In British Columbia, for a very long time, the “wellness” answer has been an elusive beast. There are so many pieces to this complex, overwhelming puzzle we call our health care system.
The health authorities of our province face multiple challenges, from staffing to funding and everything in between, and there is so much in between.
My perspective comes from sitting on the Thompson Regional Hospital District board while a director with the regional district for 10 years. I had the opportunity to experience the system from the inside out to a certain degree. From that came a few observations that some may or may not share.
Interior Health (I imagine they are not alone) is a “top down” organization. That is not to say a top down approach doesn’t work; I just believe it cannot work for an entity that has a multitude of moving parts in so many different arenas of health care.
A bottom up approach would include the paramedics, nurses, care aids, ambulance drivers, first responders, and frontline workers who see the roadblocks every day. That is where the questions need to be asked. Does Interior Health have the answers? Maybe; maybe not.
However, even if they do, more questions arise. Is there enough funding available to answer those questions? Is there enough staff to serve the population? and on and on. In many cases, the answer is “absolutely not”!
For the most part our frontline health care workers are rock stars. They put a smile on every day so that those suffering through possibly some of the worst days of their lives can have a bit of sunshine. For that we owe them a huge debt of gratitude.
We lost our daughter to addiction. A brutal illness in the cruellest of forms; a death grip that slowly strangles a desire to share and care, and which may eventually suck the life right out of them. The pain is always there, lying in wait for the next trigger. There are no gentle reminders when you lose a child.
As parents, the journey of addiction is agonizing. We ride shotgun, hoping to help chart a path to recovery. We feel as if we fail time and again. It is terrifying. Weeks turns into months, which turns into years. We see a beautiful, vibrant soul slowly melting away, our efforts falling on the deaf ears of an addict.
It’s exhausting, but that’s the easy part. The hard part is to see your child dying, physically and mentally, right before your eyes. You look for answers everywhere. Spikes of hope are followed by depths of despair. The roller coaster ride of addiction takes a toll far beyond the addiction itself.
This is just one of the many stories that reflect a system that is broken. It taxes that system: the first responders, emergency room service, hospital beds, facilities that can possibly help the addict.
Mental health and addiction go hand-in-hand. They have taken more young lives than any other illness by far. There are answers out there, and there are passionate people who try their best to be a part of the solution. Sadly, their toolbox is often half full, and you can’t put a puzzle together when half the pieces are missing.
I will leave you with some alarming numbers that showcase the gravity of the situation:
- Between 19.6 per cent and 26.2 per cent of British Columbians — somewhere around one million people — will experience a mental illness each year. An estimated 84,000 children and youth in B.C. have a diagnosed mental disorder, yet fewer than one-third of those children are receiving mental health services.
- 1,158 British Columbians died of toxic, unregulated drugs in the first half of 2024, according to data from the B.C. Coroners Service. This represents a rate of about six people per day.
- Kamloops is on pace for its second-deadliest year of the opioid crisis, with 45 people having lost their lives to fatal drug overdoses in the first half of 2024.
- In British Columbia, nearly 1.7 million people will experience a mental illness or substance use disorder in their lifetime.
The Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) has a strong message. Hopefully it rings loud.
“At CMHA BC, we believe that mental health should be treated with the same urgency and importance as physical health. Our vision is a province where everyone can access quality mental health care promptly and with dignity. That’s why we’ve developed a comprehensive roadmap . . . outlining 31 actionable recommendations for creating a voluntary, integrated, and holistic system of care in BC. This roadmap is designed to guide policymakers . . . and ensure that mental health and substance use care is accessible, equitable, and effective for all individuals living in British Columbia.”
So many questions; no easy answers. The people spoke in the recent election, with health care a top priority. Let us hope our decision-makers in Victoria hear their voices loud and clear. The cost of a broken system is sometimes life itself. Urgency should be resonating through the halls of Victoria.
