Health Committee on Nov. 1st, 2023

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

It's about 81%.

Minister, did you have a chance to read Adam Zivo's column and stories in the National Post recently about diversion?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

I'm aware of the articles by Adam Zivo, which are anecdotal.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

It's absolutely staggering.

Users go to Reddit and they buy the pills that our government gives out for free. Adam put together a spreadsheet with over 50 posts on diverted safe supply. It is staggering.

I will share it with you privately off-line, Minister, because I think you'll be staggered by that.

Are you familiar with your government's 2016 shift from an anti-drug strategy to a harm reduction strategy?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Yes, I am. It's part of the four pillars of our overall drug strategy, which includes prevention, harm reduction, treatment and enforcement, looking at this as a health crisis and also understanding that there's an important lens of public safety involved.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

You've doubled funding every year to the opioid-related health emergencies in B.C. and Alberta. In 2023, you proposed the largest annual opioid crisis expenditure to date, $359 million.

This strategy isn't working. We have leading addictions medical experts who are writing letters to you. They're imploring you to re-evaluate this.

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

If I may answer the question, I'm familiar with the letter from the 17 doctors who are involved in our substance-use addictions programs and offer prescription treatment.

However, they are experts—like there are many experts—and anyone, in my opinion—

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Do you discount their—

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

No, I don't discount anyone who is committed to helping those with substance use and is willing to save lives.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Minister, in that $25 billion sent to provinces, your recently signed health accords include shared health indicators and results intended to measure progress.

As you know, mental health services are covered under medicare only if they're delivered by doctors in hospitals. Most other services that are delivered by charities and community non-profit organizations are not systematically captured in the health reporting.

Can you please elaborate on how the government intends to accurately collect the data on the indicator that measures the median wait times for community mental health and substance-use services?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

First and foremost, the way we are looking at the data collection at this time is to have a comprehensive lens of need.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

How will the government then hold the provinces and territories accountable for funding to community mental health when the health accord itself does not direct funding specifically to community mental health services?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

The bilateral agreements include detailed work plans for the allocation of efforts and the work that will be done.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Do they specifically direct the funds to community mental health programs?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

As the member well knows, health care falls under provincial jurisdiction.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

So they don't.

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

We have key principles in place that are allowing for this. Also, we work with CIHI in ensuring that the research and the individual data are fed into the system, so we can see how it's working and monitor and evaluate—

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

What happened to the mental health transfer that your government promised during the 2021 election?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

In 2017, we made a commitment of $5 billion to mental health supports, which is ongoing, but what we learned—

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

But in the 2021 election—

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

That's all the time for questions, Mr. Doherty.

Go ahead and finish your answer, Minister.

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

What we learned through this process was that having an integrated approach to mental health services as part of primary health care is the best way to serve Canadians to receive mental health services.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you.

Next we'll have Ms. Sidhu for six minutes.

Go ahead, please.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister Saks and your team, for being with us.

My question is for Minister Saks. Many of our youth are struggling with their mental health. I understand there has been significant success with an integrated youth services model of care. Can you tell us why this approach is so promising?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

I want to thank the member for the question.

What I will say is that what we do know, particularly coming out of COVID, is that our youth, the kids, are not always all right, especially with the isolation and what went on during the pandemic with being at home. During that time period they were cut off from the social structures that really help enhance the growth and resiliency of our young people.

The federal government made a commitment to integrated youth services, which incorporate wraparound supports for youth and their families, so not only primary health care but also the other aspects of care that come with it—whether those are vocational and job training, social environments or in some cases indigenous communities' land-based learning—with an understanding that we really want to invest in our youth to make sure they have the best tools they need as well as the preventative tool of education to understand the impacts of substance use so they will be well equipped to be out in the world and understand what resources and services are available to them.

We've made sure that these are by community, in community. The best example I can give is that of the Foundry in B.C., which has a wonderful set of services, as my colleague from B.C. here on the other side of the aisle would well know. We know that the impacts of these investments are long-term, which means, if we invest in our young people now, that is an upstream approach to better mental health care for them in the future. We've seen good results and the programs are expanding.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you.

My next question is about giving birth. It's a joyful occasion. Unfortunately, we know that new parents may also be struggling. I know our message to them is to please not carry this burden alone or in silence. Getting help is the most important thing you can do for yourself.

How can you help these new parents since perinatal mental health issues can have long-lasting impacts?