Candidates face tough question during mental health forum

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This article was published 07/04/2016 (3449 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Politicians, including Manitoba’s health minister, faced a crowd of about 100 people to review a litany of shortcomings in the mental health system Thursday evening.

Both the audience and the politicians could and did put names to the lives lost in the past year; the suicide of Jill Tardiff, the disappearance of Reid Bricker and the death of Ronald Wilderman have all been high profile cases in the public spotlight since last May.

“One hundred and seventy two days, that’s how long it has been,” said Reid Bricker’s mother Bonnie Bricker who opened the forum organized by the Partners for Community Mental Health.

Bricker, who’d been hospitalized three times for suicide attempts in a span of 10 days, walked into the night after his final discharge last October.

His family believe he finally did kill himself but no trace of him has been found.

“There was no one to help him, nowhere to go. . . alone in the night he found his own answer,” his mother said.

The coalition of the city’s major mental health organizations put together the forum that Bricker opened with her indictment of the health care system.

For the next two hours, at the Asper Jewish Community Campus, Health Minister Sharon Blady, former Liberal leader and physician Jon Gerrard running for re-election in River Heights and Conservative incumbent for Charleswood Myrna Driedger presented their party’s platforms and answered questions.

They tackled a seven-point agenda of topics and detailed recommendations the mental health coalition put together for systemic changes. Those topics ranged from education in public schools and change to hospital discharge procedures to community based resources, access to services on indigenous and remote communities and immigrant communities as well as problem with the criminal justice system and how the health ministry is organized.

Political pledges

Blady disclosed her own personal battle with mood disorders to emphasize her commitment to the need for better care and listed a plethora of programs and services, including the mental health court that the NDP established to showcase her government’s record.

Driedger emphasized the Conservative commitment to improvements with a focus on expanding the scope of community resources and using front line workers to advise the Conservatives if they win the April 19 election.

Gerrard talked about Liberal campaign pledges to expand and include psychologists for Medicare coverage as well as basics, like the need for better nutrition, including omega-3, a fatty acid critical to brain health but deficient in most diets. It’s found mostly in fish.

One in four Canadians suffers from mental illness at some point in their lifetime.

Politicians were told that Canada as a country spends the least on mental health services compared to any other nation in the western world and out of all the provinces this one has the lowest budget in the country.

More stories

Elizabeth Rosenberg blamed the death of her brother Ronald Wilderman a year ago this May on negligence. Wilderman was found dead in his apartment from complications arising from diabetes, despite the fact the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority hired an agency to look after him.

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Barbara Winestock recounted the story of a young woman who committed an act of violence in the waiting room of a local hospital, hoping to be jailed because that was the only way she’d access the mental health services she needed. “You’d get a broken leg fixed easier,” she said.

Another single mother who gave her name as Kathy disclosed she shoplifted an item in full view of surveillance cameras, hoping to hauled before the province’s mental health court in order to get help. She was charged but is still paying off $20,000 in legal bills, the result of her criminal prosecution.

The evening wrapped up with the politicians offering apologies and expressing deep concern.

“This can’t continue. We have to put resources into the mental health system,” Gerrard said.