Mr. Chair and committee, my area of expertise is mental health. Simply put, when people are not treated well, they don't feel very good.
You've heard this before, and your other report has referred to it as “minority stress”. If I could explain minority stress as a math formula, it would be internalized homo/bi/transphobia, with the addition of stigma, the expectation of rejection and discrimination plus actual experiences of discrimination and violence. This equals minority stress.
Minority stress is directly linked to mental health distress and suicide. A recent report found that LGBTQ people and indigenous people in the Waterloo region have three to four times higher rates of mental illness and suicidal behaviour. This is why we need to change the landscape of our community and end homo/bi/transphobia and stop minority stress.
I'd like to share an example with you. Since 2005, we've helped start more than 30 GSAs in Waterloo region, in public, Catholic and private schools. As you know, GSAs are vital, offering psychological, social and physical protective factors for LGBTQ youth.
Today, young people are coming out earlier and earlier. I believe this is due to the shifting social and legal landscape in Canada. Research indicates that when young people come out, they often face victimization from their peers. This can have really lasting negative effects, given the developmental phase that teens are in. Because of our work in schools, we are presently surprised with the OutLook data, which shows that the majority of LGBTQ students receive supports from their classmates and teachers. In fact, and unfortunately, in Waterloo region, students receive more support from the schools than they do from their parents.
A recent study on GSAs in Canada was able to survey one-third of Canadian school districts and only a half of them reported having GSAs.
The well-being of LGBTQ people does not begin when they enter a doctor's office or my therapy room; it begins at birth. Having GSAs, resources and education to support LGBTQ youth is vital. This definitely includes the privacy of students being able to attend these groups without parental consent or knowledge.
Our counselling team supports many transgender clients. Often those who want to medically transition are not able to get the medical care they need from their doctor, so we do our best to help navigate the health care system and help them find the services they need.
I'm also often asked to write letters of support verifying someone's transgender identity before they're able to access medical service. This is sometimes known as a psychiatric or readiness assessment. I myself was asked to get one of these letters before I was able to access my own trans health care services.
As a social worker, I find this very odd. In no other circumstances do you have to write a letter to access the medical care that you need in Ontario. Like other health care services, trans health needs to operate on an informed consent model. Currently, too many people have to jump through hoops proving to often cisgender professionals, such as social workers or doctors who lack training, that they are trans enough in order to receive the medical care they need. This needs to change.
Effective trans care services include the patient-first, informed consent approach. It should not be left in the hands of me or a doctor to decide what somebody's gender identity is or is not, especially when research suggests that transgender clients are the ones educating their doctor—at 48%—or their mental health provider—at 53%—on what trans health issues are, in part because trans health is not included in formal education for medical or mental health providers.
We need to invest in our young people's well-being and their families.
I would like to share a story about myself. When I was 12 years old, I asked my brother if he would still love me if I were gay, and he said no. As you can imagine, I didn't talk about it again. I went away to university and I came back and decided that that was when I was going to talk about it, and so I told him. He took a deep breath and he turned to me, and he said, “Me too”. That means that we lived decades of our lives in silence. We weren't able to share a big part of who we were with each other, and it's not because our community was particularly homophobic or transphobic, it's because our identities just didn't exist—we were erased. There were no resources for my brother, for my family, or for me; and my story is not unique.
To me, one of the worst statistics, but not the most surprising that is coming out of the OutLook study, is that the majority of LGBTQ people have pretended to be straight or cisgender. They have erased who they are in order to function or feel safe in their community. I don't want another young person to have to erase who they are so they can get the medical care that they need, so they can go to school, so they can feel safe or so they can get a job.
We need to grow this idea of affirming supportive care and opportunities for LGBTQ youth across the country so that they can not only survive but thrive. This means that at a minimum we need to ban conversion therapy across Canada. We need to ensure that child protection workers, medical and mental health providers have adequate training and resources to effectively support LGBTQ youth and their families.
Transgender health care needs to operate on an informed-consent, patient-first model. We need GSAs to be supported in all schools across the country, LGBTQ content in the curriculum and comprehensive sexual health information.
I am proud to say that we are working to change homo/bi/transphobia in Waterloo region, knowing that just providing counselling in our community is not enough. We need to change how people are treated in our community, in order to improve their overall well-being. We knew we had to get involved in our community, with our schools, our police, our doctors and our businesses to try to create a community where no one is left behind.
Unfortunately, much of what we do in the OK2BME program is precarious, as our funding is not consistent or secure. I do not know what the future of my program will look like without adequate support and resources. I do know, however, that our holistic approach has benefited our community, and this is my ultimate recommendation to the committee.
Quite simply, we need to change our existing services, from data collection to the overall health care system, so we stop creating barriers and environments where people feel it necessary to hide or erase who they are, or worse, not get the care they need. We can change our data collection processes, but if people don't feel safe enough to identify, then the system change will not solve the problem alone. This also matters in hospitals.
In Waterloo region, and I suspect it's not different for the rest of the community, we know that 26% of transgender people have avoided the emergency room when they needed to access care, because of their gender identity. We need to start creating system changes that effectively support LGBTQ people, so they can feel safe and supported in every sector.
Our OK2BME program is an excellent holistic model for bringing change. I'd like to share that in the last year, we have helped get rainbow crosswalks installed in Kitchener and Waterloo; provided counselling to 454 individuals, families and couples; and 5,149 people have benefited from our youth group, public education and consultation services, all with very little funding, and a dedicated team.
Lastly, I want to share that the LGBTQ community is incredibly diverse in terms of both opportunities and inequities. That means that racialized, two-spirit, LGBTQ newcomers and individuals who live rurally may be further marginalized and disproportionately affected by inadequate health care and mental health supports. Targeted consultations, supports and resources will be needed to effectively support these communities.
Thank you for inviting us to this consultation. I hope you continue to engage with the diverse LGBTQ community, as you continue on this journey to improve the lives of LGBTQ Canadians.
Thank you.