First Nation Goods

Behind the Headlines: A Look at Indigenous Mental Health

mitch — Wed, 02 Nov 2022 17:53:39 +0000

Do you remember the horrendous reports of Indigenous, Inuit and Métis youth suicides? Native healers and government interventions have stemmed the losses, however, the underlying causes remain unchanged and a significant portion of Canada’s population is woefully underserved. As vulnerable youths become young adults, they will need other mental health support.

Indigenous Mental Health: The Human Costs

Suffering from racism, stereotypes, ignorance, and being devastated by historical government interventions, Indigenous people in Canada deal with serious challenges regarding mental illness and inadequate health care services.

Indigenous on reserves are twice as likely as the non-Indigenous population to experience major depression and other mental illnesses. A survey found 16% of First Nation adults living on reserve experienced major depression, compared to 8% of the Canadian population. First Nations youth are nine times more likely to experience mental health problems than their Canadian peers, according to the Library of Parliament

The British Columbia Aboriginal Survivors Study found only two of 127 residential school survivors to be free of mental illness, 30.4% experienced a major depressive episode, 26.1% had chronic depression and 64.2% had post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Each of these disorders is a risk factor for suicide. Statistics Canada reports that suicide rates among First Nations youth are five to seven times that of non-Indigenous youth and Inuit youth at a rate of eleven times greater. First Nations men die by suicide 2.4 times the national average and women five times.

The Needs

Centuries of victimization through colonization, residential schools, child welfare programs (including the Sixties Scoop), and intergenerational trauma have led to these mental health challenges, higher rates of suicide, and substance abuse. These are compounded on reserves and in isolated communities by the lack of housing, food security, and clean water essential for mental well-being. Further, the struggle to hold onto traditions in the face of overwhelming Western values and thinking worsens the plight.

However, research has found youth in communities with a high level of cultural continuity are less likely to die by suicide or develop substance use disorder.

But the pandemic has further isolated Indigenous youth and those in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer and Two-Spirit (LGBTQ2S) community. They are more likely to experience mental health issues such as depression and anxiety.

Approximately 33.8% of female and 17.2% of male youth living on reserve reported they felt sad, blue or depressed for two weeks or more in a row in the previous twelve months. This is worsened given mental wellness services are now via virtual and telehealth media, since many remote communities struggle with limited connectivity.

Embracing Traditional Healing

Holistic Indigenous healing interconnects family, community, spirituality, and nature. In Indigenous communities, wellness is about balance and harmony. The focus is on strengths not weaknesses, along with a sense of control over one’s own health. Individuals may avoid Western mental health and addiction treatment for fear of being stigmatized.

Indigenous treatment may include traditional teaching, spiritual practices like ceremonial prayers and songs, sacred remedies such as tobacco, sweet grass, or sage, healing circles, sweat lodges, and consulting with elders or healers. Ideally, these practices could be pursued in combination with contemporary mental health interventions.

Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) recently launched Shkaabe Makwa. (Spirit Bear Helper) This is an Indigenous-led hospital centre incorporating traditional healing to improve health-care services for First Nation, Inuit and Métis members.

Still, Mental Health Care Gaps Remain

The federal government has recognized the gaps and needed changes identified by research projects and has been working with First Nations organizations to address disparities in mental health care and expand access to public health. The government has “committed to instilling a zero-tolerance approach to racism against Indigenous peoples across all healthcare systems in Canada.”

In addition, the National Collaborating Centre for Indigenous Health (NCCIH) was established in 2005 “to support First Nations, Inuit, and Métis public health renewal and health equity through knowledge translation and exchange.”

Still, there remains a severe lack of mental health services available to this vulnerable population. Blatant disparities separate Canada’s Indigenous from non-Indigenous. While provincial systems continuously improve healthcare outcomes through increasingly objective empirical evidence; Indigenous healthcare remains subjective and data deficient.

The groups which face the greatest risks of suicide are those with the least access to state-of-the-art health services.

Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission was formed to compensate survivors and their families for residential schools’ impact as well as to address the injustices and inequities suffered by the Indigenous. While the commission resulted in specific healthcare calls to action, First Nations peoples continue to wait. Meanwhile, mental health crises continue relentlessly in Indigenous communities.

SOURCE:

The Hope

Eli’s Place could fill a gap for vulnerable young adults with serious mental illness. Our long-term vision is to incorporate traditional healing practices with contemporary therapies on a working farm so sufferers can recover, grow and thrive in nature.

Richard Childs: Father of the late Lucas, outdoors person, haiku and technical writer, and facilitator of organizational change. Grateful volunteer helping Eli’s Place come to fruition to save and enable young adult lives.

Eli’s Place will be a farm-based residential treatment centre helping adults aged 18-35 who have been diagnosed with serious mental illness. As we envision Eli’s Place, we anticipate that yoga will play an important role in supporting the journey from mental illness to hopeful futures.

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The impact of climate change on indigenous peoples across Canada

mitch — Wed, 01 Jun 2022 02:49:11 +0000

Canada’s concern about climate change

Canada has long acknowledged the belief that free and open trade, conserving the environment and acting on climate change must go hand in hand. Sustainable success will rely on this. At the UN Climate Change Conference (COP), Canada motivated the organization of robust guidance for nationally inferred contributions to assist nations to develop explicit and transparent relief commitments that indicate their highest feasible ambition in light of their national circumstances.

The nation has furthermore worked with additional parties to formulate guidance for tracking their growth. They will proceed to support a leading international emphasis on modification actions, especially for developing nations. To shape the capacity to adjust to the effects of a changing climate, Canada will motivate parties to undertake planning processes for adoption at the national level and report on their growth, to share their knowledge and lessons discovered.

Impact of climate change on indigenous peoples

Although climate change has an impact on all communities, Indigenous peoples are among the first and most harshly affected.

It is crucial to emphasize that the threats that climate change poses to indigenous peoples vary from the threats that it poses to other communities in society, including the poor (in their entirety). This is because indigenous peoples share some characteristics that, in combination, do not exist in any other community. Therefore, they are extremely vulnerable to the direct impacts of climate change.

Indigenous peoples are generally very poor, which makes them most vulnerable to climate change.
They rely on renewable natural resources and are most at risk due to climate variability and extremes in their economic activities and occupations.
They dwell in geographical areas and ecosystems that are most exposed to the consequences of climate change, while also sharing a complicated cultural connection with such ecosystems.
Increased levels of exposure and vulnerability to climate change force these people to migrate, which in most cases is not a solution and can instead worsen social and economic vulnerabilities.
Gender inequality, an important factor in the deprivation endured by the communities’ women, is amplified by climate change.
Multiple such communities continue to encounter exclusion from decision-making procedures, constantly lacking recognition and institutional assistance. This restricts their access to solutions, increases their vulnerability to climate change, weakens their ability to mitigate and adjust to climate change, and accordingly poses a danger to the progress made in protecting their rights.

Flaws and difficulties of countering climate change

The potential danger of climate change to these peoples’ very presence is blended with several legal and institutional barriers, which affect their ability to resist and adapt to climate change, thus making climate change a problem of human rights and inequality for indigenous peoples. It is furthermore crucial to notice that strengthening and aiding the adaptive ability of indigenous peoples will merely be successful if it is incorporated with other policies such as catastrophe preparation, land-use planning, environmental preservation and national strategies for sustainable development.

In several instances, adapting to new circumstances needs extra financial resources and the transfer of technical abilities that most indigenous populations do not possess. While short-term adaptation actions are underway, resource and capacity limitations are hampering the enactment of long-term adaptive policies. The full and practical participation of indigenous communities is important to the development of State-developed mitigation assessments to guarantee that such strategies do not negatively impact vulnerable communities.

Indigenous people can also be crucial to fighting climate change, due to their intimate understanding of how to regulate the territory that they’ve always inhabited. The impacts of climate change are certainly a crucial matter and need to be dealt with. By weakening the ways of indigenous people, humanity is in danger of losing one of the best and cheapest means, it has to fight climate change.

First Nation Good’s Pledge

First Nation Good’s has partnered with indigenous climate activists to spread awareness of the critical impacts that climate change has on the native communities across North America.

Proceeds from all Indigenous Climate Action sales go towards indigenous climate change initiatives and awareness campaigns.

The post The impact of climate change on indigenous peoples across Canada first appeared on First Nation Goods.

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First Nation Goods Develops Clean Water Initiative for First Nation Communities in Canada

mitch — Wed, 16 Mar 2022 16:08:09 +0000

First Nation Goods Announces Clean Water Initiative

TORONTO, ON, CANADA, MARCH 2, 2022 /EINPRESSWIRE.COM/ — THE ORGANIZATION IS SEEKING PARTNERS TO BRING CLEAN WATER TO INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES IN CANADA.

First Nation Goods, a company offering a wide range of services and products to Indigenous people and communities in Canada, announces the Clean Water For All initiative. The effort seeks to promote and provide access to clean water for Indigenous communities.

First Nation Goods promotes the right of Indigenous communities to self-govern and achieve basic human rights as set forth in the UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. It believes the path to helping achieve this is by providing clean water and proper sanitation techniques to all First Nations. The company partners with TrueNorthAid, SDWF (Safe Water Drinking Foundation) and Water First. Together, they support the four core values of the Clean Water For All initiative:

Everyone has a right to safe and clean water.

The water crisis in Indigenous communities in Canada is unacceptable.

Skills training is critical to building sustainable solutions to water challenges in First Nation communities.

Collaborative programs with First Nations communities should integrate Indigenous values, knowledge, customs, and traditions at every opportunity.

“We don’t accept the water crisis in these communities,” says a spokesperson for First Nation Goods.

Boil water advisories in these communities are commonplace, even in one of the most water-rich countries in the world. In 2015, 126 First Nations were placed under a drinking water advisory. As of 2021, 33 nations remained under the advisory.

Concerned citizens and organizations, including First Nation Goods, note that the Canadian government has yet to fulfill its promise of providing the necessary funding to establish water and sanitation treatment systems. To make up for the lack of funding, the government has proposed using public-private partnerships (P3s) to address the issue.

Opponents of P3s note that such partnerships are typically costly and often lead to the privatization of water. This still leaves local communities vulnerable because they have no control over water services. This has become more important due to COVID-19 and the lingering pandemic.

First Nation Goods also seeks to expand its partnership base with other businesses and nonprofits that serve and/or care about First Nation communities. The initiative needs to provide financial and volunteer support to educate and train communities on safe water techniques and encourage the development of high-quality drinking water and sanitation services. Advocates willing to pressure government officials to fulfill promises to help make clean water available to all First Nation communities and create a “Boil Water Advisory” free Canada are also needed.

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