Thanks very much.
First, Tracy and Katharine, I would like to know a little more about the need for Inuit specific research and approaches. Could you describe to the committee the link between childhood sexual abuse and addiction, the link between childhood sexual abuse and leaving a community, leaving a family? I don't know whether you have any experience with that. What we've heard more recently, which I hadn't thought of, was about children fleeing abusive foster care. That seems to be under-reported.
I wonder if you would also tell us about your experience—maybe Tracy in B.C., as well—with there not being enough shelters and also the invisibility of the existing ones. In downtown Toronto, for example, the shelters are invisible. No one knows about them. There's no sign on the front. Nobody can find out where they are. I've been to the one in Apex in Iqaluit and everybody knows where the shelter is, and if someone wants to come after somebody who has been so bold as to leave the household and embarrass him, that person knows where to find her.
The solutions are different. Obviously, there are not enough shelters. But even ensuring safety in the shelters is more difficult in remote and rural communities.
I wondered what research you think still needs to be done. What would be your suggestions? I had many patients who ended up addicted because they were numbing themselves from being daddy's or uncle's little girl. That was the way they dealt with that, and then they ended up more likely to be addicted, a street worker, whatever. It was part of the numbing out that needed to happen for lack of treatment.
Can you tell me where you are in the research, and where you'd like to go?