The main challenge that veterans in crisis face is accessing physical and mental health services after their release.
Veterans are social orphans upon release. Overnight, they lose access to support resources, including doctors. They sit on a wait-list for months to be assigned to a doctor in the civilian system.
Disorders, mainly mental health disorders, that were underlying at the time of their release will manifest themselves at some point. When the situation takes a turn for the worse, veterans have no support or resources to help them.
Staff in the provincial health care system are unfamiliar with Veterans Affairs Canada's administrative procedures. They are already overwhelmed with administrative tasks, which means that civilian doctors will even have to refuse to fill out documents because of their complexity, even if they're offered compensation.
As far as I know, there is no mechanism in Quebec for identifying veterans within the health care system. As a result, they aren't treated based on a full picture of their health, which means that they don't receive the care specific to their situation.
The fact that Veterans Affairs Canada has withdrawn from providing frontline health services in recent years reinforces the perception that veterans are left without direct support and that there has been a loss of expertise in treating health issues specific to the veteran community because of the disappearance of those in-house services.
Here are a few facts for you to consider.
The Canadian Armed Forces and Veterans Affairs Canada do not have a system in place to transfer medical records between themselves. That means that veterans have to make an access to information request to access their own file, which will be transferred to another federal organization.
The transition services for Canadian Forces are mandated to support veterans until their release. After that, the community takes over.
Veterans Affairs Canada also does not proactively offer support services. Veterans have to chase down those services.
There's no mechanism to transfer files between the federal government and provincial governments.
Veterans Affairs Canada delivers services to veterans, but the key to accessing the services is in the hands of someone who doesn't even know they have that key in their kit, and that's the doctor. Veterans have to go looking for this key, sometimes putting their health and even their lives at risk.
During that process, that's when veterans are most vulnerable. They have to make decisions or draft documents that will have a significant impact on their lives.
It's also no good blaming the front-line managers and respondents at Veterans Affairs Canada. They're doing the best they can, given the training, autonomy and support they receive from their organization. We're talking about processes, processes and more processes.
Finally, we're convinced that prevention and local teamwork are the only effective ways to reduce suicidal ideation. It isn't cool, it isn't photogenic, it isn't clickbait, and it isn't good for statistics, because it's impossible to measure the success of prevention, because nothing happened. It's the first time that nothing has happened, so that's good.
Everywhere, it's difficult and complex. As with homelessness, when it comes to mental health and other challenges that veterans face, prevention saves lives.
All we are asking for is consistency, a little honour, a little humanity and, above all, respect.
Let's talk less and do better together.
Thank you.