The Chronicle Herald (Provincial)
Action urged on threats to children’s well-being
The pandemic has shone a light on the unfair plight of many young people in Canada, children's advocates say.
A recent report from Raising Canada and Children First Canada concludes that children are in crisis and have experienced widespread violations of their human rights such as lack of government funding support and access to medical services.
“Sadly, it doesn't surprise me,” said Sara Austin of Children First Canada in an interview Wednesday.
“Over the past decade, we've seen a very steady decline in children's health and wellbeing in Canada. There is this persistent myth that Canada is one of the best places in the world to raise a child and that simply isn't true. We've gone from being ranked 10th in the world for child well-being to now being ranked 30th out of 38 wealthy nations, according to UNICEF and that was prepandemic.”
The pandemic that began in early 2020 has only exacerbated the problems that many Canadian children face such as domestic abuse, poverty, food insecurity and ill health.
“The most concerning to me, was, you know, that really steady decline that we see across children's mental and physical health,” Austin said. “We know the school closures have had a really devastating impact not only because of education but on their overall well-being.”
Activist Rae Steeves said children have been swamped with negativity over the past couple of years from the pandemic to fears about the impact of climate change.
“This has definitely been a really difficult year for all of us to navigate,” said Steeves, 15, of Halifax. “We're all just trying to figure out the best way to go about (dealing with) multiple crises happening at the moment. But the main point is that during COVID the strain in our system has highlighted (the problems) and we're starting to see things a little more clearly.”
Steeves, who's going into Grade 11 this year at Citadel High School, has been a grassroots activist since she was 13 with organizations including School Strike for Climate Halifax.
She's recently won a grant from Rising Youth Canda to write a book about intersectional feminism — with the help of two friends — called The Woman's Issue, which has been distributed to many school libraries.
“It was very exciting,” she said. “I've always loved writing and I was really grateful to have this opportunity to channel my passion into something that may help other people.”
CHILDREN NOT SAFE
Steeves said she's been lucky in having the support of friends and family during the pandemic “but a lot of people don't have that . ... COVID should be a wake-up call that many children are not safe at home. Child abuse, mental health, poverty, hunger. What I mean is that school has been a safe place for a lot of people and without that, children are just at home without that support, a lot of them aren't safe.”
Austin said government continues to let children down when it comes to addressing threats to children such as deteriorating mental health, food insecurity, infant mortality, as well as increasing evidence of child abuse, systemic racism and poverty.
Recommendations from the report released Tuesday include safely reopening schools, camps, parks and other recreational facilities, scaling up virtual care programs, reducing backlogs for surgeries and rehabilitation and investing in new models of mental health programs for young people.
The federal election campaign has highlighted the lack of leadership, Austin said.
“We worked closely with all of the federal parties leading up to the election to provide them with policy recommendations on what was needed to address these top threats to children, and I'm deeply disappointed that we aren't seeing the big bold commitments that are really required to help our kids survive and thrive.”