If a mental health condition were to be service related as a result of trauma experienced in a battlefield incident and not accompanied by a physical injury, that would certainly count in a wounded-in-action scenario.
One of the priorities I have continued to strive for is to have a mental health injury looked on in the same way as a physical injury—a bad back, a shrapnel wound, a bad knee, or a turned ankle. I think the Canadian Forces have an opportunity, in my estimation, to lead this country in reducing the stigma associated with mental health. I think we've come a long way in that regard. I freely acknowledge that there is room to improve, but I think we have seen some real progress lately in reducing the stigma associated with mental health.
When we bring soldiers out of theatre, before we bring them home we send them to a third location to decompress for a period of five days. During that five-day decompression period, they get a series of lectures and consultations on the importance of mental health and what a potential degraded state of mental health might look like. Based on that, I have seen young males, who in my estimation typically have the hardest time admitting they might have a mental health condition, put their hand up and say they'd like to see somebody. I think even as little as five years ago that type of admission, certainly in public, would have been inconceivable, and I take that as a sign of how we are moving forward in educating people that it's all right to put your hand up if you have a mental health condition.
Now, in fairness, I know your question was related to wounded in action, but the preponderance of mental health issues that we deal with in the Canadian Forces are not PTSD related. There are a lot of other mental health conditions, but your question was specifically about the....