Health committee  Yes, absolutely. Of course, suicide in particular and other mental health topics as well are stigmatized for everyone. There is a reluctance to open up. There is a reluctance to confront it head-on. You might imagine that for folks like sexual and gender minorities who have a hi

Health committee  Yes. The way to deal with that is to have that training led by organizations with strong histories of doing good work with queer communities. You're right, though. We need both approaches. It won't reach everyone, so we need a general suicide prevention approach—a universal prev

Health committee  That's correct.

Health committee  Yes, that happens in some cases.

Health committee  I think the most typical scenario would be a minor who's living under guardianship. Their parent or guardian might be concerned when their child expresses a form of distress or starts questioning their gender or their sexuality. At that point you might imagine—given what we've ta

Health committee  Yes. The countries I am aware of that have done this are Malta and Taiwan. The risk in leaving it to provinces to regulate for the health care provider communities is that it pushes this practice into settings that are outside of medical practices. It could be in individuals' h

Health committee  To be honest, I'm not prepared to answer that, but I would say that there are organizations and individuals in Canada working directly with survivors of conversion therapy, most notably including Generous Space, which is a national organization based here in Ontario. They would b

Health committee  That's a great question. Historically, mental health professionals, including psychologists and psychiatrists, practised versions of conversion therapy. Homosexuality was, up until the late 1960s, considered a mental illness. There are some roots of it in the mental health profe

Health committee  Mr. Chair and members of the standing committee, it is a privilege to address you this afternoon. My name is Travis Salway and I'm an epidemiologist and a post-doctoral research fellow at the University of British Columbia, where I study how stigma and stress affect the health of