It's a big goal, and I think one of the ways we've started to think about it is that we have universal health care but not universal mental health care. What you would find in other G7 nations, with the exception of the United States, is a fully funded mental health care system that includes everything, from the basic sorts of treatments we described in BounceBack for depression and anxiety, all the way to the treatment of major mental illness.
Right now, what we have in Canada is a system that is funded for clinical care. We fund hospitals and psychiatrists, but we don't fund psychologists, psychotherapists, and depression and anxiety care and treatment. We want to see funding for a full cycle of care, the full-step care model, as it's called. The piece that's missing is early intervention for community mental health care.
In the United Kingdom right now, if you're experiencing depression or anxiety, you can go to a community centre and get in-person or virtual care. It's been fantastically successful. It's inexpensive and it takes pressure off the critical care system. That is the kind of investment we would like to see in the longer term.
Where does the federal government come in? We believe there would probably have to be changes to the Canada Health Act, as one step, and there needs to be mechanisms so the federal government can fund the provinces to ensure there is allocation for these other aspects of step care for mental health.