Focus on mental-health care
Re Gift a symbol of progress, Editorial, Jan. 14 Although Bell Canada and other philanthropists have stepped up to support mental health at CAMH and elsewhere, access to appropriate, effective mental-health care needs to be seen as a basic human right and component of a publicly funded health-care system.
Governments need to step up and fund services and community supports. Ontario has yet to declare how is will use the $1.9 billion in funding it will receive from the federal government over the next 10 years to improve mental-health services.
It should also be recognized that the federal funding only gets Ontario 16 per cent of the way to the 9-per-cent health spending target recommended by the Mental Health Commission of Canada in 2012. Even the Progressive Conservative Party’s recent pledge to match the federal dollars if elected only gets us 30 per cent of the way there.
Ontario’s mental-health share of health funding has declined from 11.3 per cent in 1979 to 6.5 per cent now. In the next budget, the provincial government has the opportunity to show that mental health is a priority. Between 2011 and 2016, it invested $180 million in community mental-health and addiction services while investing $3.8 billion in other areas of health care. This needs to change. Steve Lurie, Canadian Mental Health Association, Toronto After decades of fruitless research dedicated to seeking quick fixes for complex problems, in which patients serve primarily as guinea pigs, CAMH has had its chance.
People suffering mental illness were deinstitutionalized without necessary community supports, to be managed by law enforcement and ER staff who lack the skills and facilities to respond respectfully. Except for the slapdash integration of a few meditation techniques wrenched out of cultural context, psychiatric research unimaginatively has generated only variations on existing pharmaceuticals, the side effects of which outweigh sketchy benefits.
Individuals report that the short-term and group therapies accessed after distressingly long wait lists are an insult to the intelligence of patients and service providers alike.
Psychiatry wields the power to apply stigmatizing labels to people mistakenly pitied and dismissed as hopeless. The failure of medical professionals to advocate for rigorous research into the evident medical potential of cannabis and to curb lab opioid profiteering, disqualifies them from further public trust.
The $100 million needs to be invested into housing, employment supports and the long-term intensive therapy that humane care for mental illness entails. Catharine MacTavish, Toronto
As a former psychiatric patient, I was glad to see CAMH receive such a generous gift. Much has been said of attracting top talent and hoped-for clinical breakthroughs. However, there seems to be no plan to use any of these funds to ease the immediate suffering of the patient population.
Before Christmas, CAMH was soliciting donations on social media for a fund that could provide socks, warm gloves, toiletries and other sorely needed goods for its patients, many of whom are economically disadvantaged as a result of their illness. Surely with $100 million available, some small amount could be used directly for patients’ needs. Patrick McDonald, Toronto
“The $100 million needs to be invested into housing, employment supports and the long-term intensive therapy that humane care for mental illness entails.” CATHARINE MACTAVISH TORONTO