Status of Women Committee on Feb. 5th, 2014

[Merryl Bear]

With regard to engaging the needs of marginalized communities, it's my opinion that the best way to do that is to actually collaborate with them. They will be the individuals who will be able to provide the most appropriate entrees into their communities with the support of experts in eating disorders.

In terms of funding for a national awareness campaign or strategy, I would prefer to see a strategy rather than a campaign being funded. It might be semantics, but I think of a campaign as a one-off project, whereas I see a strategy as being mindful and focused on the multiple levels of society that need to be engaged in a conversation about eating disorders and food and weight preoccupation in general. That would be at multiple levels of society.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

When you're talking about a national strategy, how would you view that outreach? There are communities that are a little bit more difficult to get to, and Canada is actually quite vast. Are you talking about putting something on the Internet or are you talking about bringing in the school systems, the school boards? I'm trying to get some sense on that as well. You've talked about the education piece, the health piece, and the justice piece, but I'm just trying to see how we actually put this all together.

[Merryl Bear]

All of those are useful aspects of a national strategy. There are huge opportunities to use new technology and media to engage with individuals. Developing a website is not, in my opinion, useful unless one knows about it and has access to it.

NEDIC, for example, is a very well-kept secret in Canada because we don't have the resources to raise our profile. I wouldn't want to replicate or duplicate things that already exist. I would want to see a strategy where there's an environmental scan of what does exist in the country, pull together what actually is working and what is good, and amplify it. We don't need to start from the beginning.

Many of the local community organizations have made very good inroads into the local communities, and we can capitalize on that. They have the trust of their communities. They're working in the institutions, not just the schools, but the health care system and other institutions as well. A strong collaborative strategy is what I think is sustainable.

[The Chair, NDP, Hélène LeBlanc]

Thank you very much.

Ms. O'Neill Gordon, you have the floor for seven minutes.

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

Thank you for being with us. Certainly, this is a very important topic to all of us, and with your years of experience—you sure have a lot of experience—you can provide us with a lot of information.

As we look over and listen to your presentation, we are speaking here about treatments, and a lot of what your organization talks about is prevention and awareness. How have you found that this preventive approach is working so far?

[Merryl Bear]

This is an area that is also underfunded, so it's very difficult to implement evidence-based prevention strategies, especially as a national strategy.

As much as there is a need for increased funding and kinds of treatment for eating disorders, so too there is a need to step back and look at what evidence-based prevention programs exist—there are some—and to see how they can be integrated into curricula, whether it's in the schools, at primary and secondary levels, or in professional training.

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

What can we learn from this about new potential practices?

[Merryl Bear]

I'm sorry, could you repeat the question?

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

What can we learn from this about new potential practices, practices that we'll promote later that perhaps would be even more helpful than this? Are there any other means that we can use?

[Merryl Bear]

I'm sorry, I don't understand the question. Are you asking me to comment on additional strategies?

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

Yes.

[Merryl Bear]

Additional to school-based strategies?

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

Yes.

[Merryl Bear]

Okay.

It's a big challenge, because many of the attitudes and beliefs that underpin eating disorders are endorsed by our culture. We need to create a cognitive dissonance. We need to have a conversation that starts to enable individuals to begin to challenge the understanding of what is health, what is a healthy body, and what is a healthy mind.

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

Okay.

I know a family with a daughter who had an eating disorder. She received a lot of help, and went off to a facility where she was given the help she needed. Today she is a nurse and is doing very well. However, her parents and her other siblings had to deal with this, and they certainly had a very tough time handling it.

I'm just wondering if you can elaborate on what help is out there for parents and other siblings.

[Merryl Bear]

There's very little, actually. There are the local community organizations—I've referenced some of them—which do have groups to support family members and significant others of an individual with an eating disorder.

For those individuals who don't have access to that, if they can call NEDIC, then we do provide them with information about the Canadian Mental Health Association local branches or other opportunities in their community where they might be able to get some support.

It's spotty, and many of the individuals who staff mental health organizations don't have training or education in eating disorders. It can be frustrating for family members and significant others to get support in their local community.

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

Would you say this is probably one of the most difficult tasks you have to deal with in this area?

[Merryl Bear]

Yes. One of the most difficult tasks we have is that when we pick up the phone, we ask how we can help the caller at the other end and there is absolutely no service to which we can refer them. We cannot fabricate or make treatments and support services available. It's a very difficult conversation to have.

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

As a great friend of the mother and father, I know it was very difficult just to talk to them about this. As is always the case, they were always just hoping that she'd get over it and that it wasn't anything really serious. It wasn't until she was finally diagnosed with this that they began to realize it and to then look for help for her and for them.

It was difficult, as a great friend, to know where to turn; that's what I'm saying.

[Merryl Bear]

Yes.

[Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, Conservative, Miramichi, NB]

We spoke last year to a doctor who was vocal about the effect of the media and its representation of women. For young women, young people, this sends certainly a message about beauty.

Could you tell us more about your campaign “Cast Responsibly, Retouch Minimally”, which is aimed at fashion?

[Merryl Bear]

It was a pro bono campaign that we developed with an advertising agency. We were focusing on raising awareness both in the public domain and in industry about the unattainable beauty ideals that are in the fashion industry, in fact, in marketing. It's not just the fashion and beauty industries. If you want to look at what kinds of bodies are used to sell cars or tires or whatever it is, it is across all the marketing of consumer goods.

What we wanted to do was raise awareness of the damage that it does when we hold onto a very narrow idea of what is beauty and what that ideal beauty can bring the individual.

[The Chair, NDP, Hélène LeBlanc]

Thank you.

[Merryl Bear]

We were very successful among industry in raising awareness. We got a lot of media in the advertising and marketing publications.

[The Chair, NDP, Hélène LeBlanc]

That's good news. It's good to hear the campaign was good.

Thank you very much.

Now we go to Ms. Duncan for seven minutes please.