Suicide and self-inflicted injuries are the leading causes
of death among First Nations youth and adults.
According to the Centre for Suicide Prevention, the suicide
rate among First Nations males aged 15-24 is 126 per 100,000 people, compared
with 24 per 100,000 for non-Aboriginal males. For First Nations females, the
rate is 35 per 100,000, compared with only 5 per 100,000 for non-Aboriginal
females. Children as young as 10 have taken their own lives.
"It's a problem for the whole community, but it's a
problem that it's the youth that are dying. It's the future," said Gerald McKinley, an associate professor at the University of Western Ontario, who
specialises in Aboriginal health issues in northern Ontario. Suicide is
associated with poverty, discrimination and ongoing colonisation of First
Nations communities in Canada, he said, and having one suicide in a community
can trigger other people. "While suicide is not a traditional aspect of
the culture, it spreads through a community like a virus," McKinley
explained. McKinley said any viable solution to the Aboriginal health crisis
must be based within the communities and build on the strengths of those most
at risk. "Youth need to be involved in the solution. They need to be
someone that we work with," he said.
Karl Hele, director of First Peoples Studies at Concordia
University in Montreal, told Al Jazeera that Aboriginal health is tied to long-standing
issues related to Canadian colonialism. Inadequate housing, a lack of access to
clean water, the high cost of food, long-standing abuse stemming from
residential schools, and inadequate government funding directly tie into health
problems in First Nations communities, Hele said. "You can solve health
crises, but as long as you have more people than are capable in a house and the
house is full of mould, what's the point?"
A report by Canada's Auditor General, released last year,
painted a damning picture of the quality of healthcare offered to residents of
remote First Nations communities in Ontario and Manitoba. About 400 Health
Canada nurses provide services to approximately 95,000 people living in these
areas, the report stated. Health Canada provided $103m in 2013-2014 to support
these nursing stations, and $175m over the same period to pay transportation
costs when residents access medical services outside their community. But many
nurses in these outposts did not have the training to respond to serious
emergencies, and they were not given clear directives to act beyond their
stated duties, the report found. Only one of 45 nurses surveyed in the report
had completed all five necessary training courses, including advanced cardiac
life support, trauma life support and advanced paediatric life support. Health
Canada "did not take into account community health needs" when
allocating services, and had not made sure the communities had comparable
access to services as others living in similar locations.
Donnie McKay, a band councillor in Pimicikamak Cree Nation
(Cross Lake) in northern Manitoba, said "I'm past sympathy. I'm past
begging," he said. "I just want my people to see that they have
something to look forward to."
The essential reason why these people feeling suicidal is that
their culture has been decimated. It is hard to imagine what it feels like to
know that your cultural roots have been deliberately wiped out and replaced
with a society based on greed. They are lost people, caught between two worlds that
makes them feel despair and despondency. Many live in "rural ghettos"
with no way to earn a living.
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