The Editor,
A powerful personal example can substantiate the claim that our mental health system is failing.
We all know that although that Premier John Horgan’s government has endowed disabled British Columbians with increased benefits, thousands of individuals continue to lack access to mental health care and intervention.
Take my good friend Abby (not her real name). Up until a decade ago, she’d struggled valiantly to remain a working contributor to society despite having suffered repeated incidents of sexual and physical abuse, events that led to mental illness and alcoholism.
At her breaking point, Abby was forced to take disability leave from her retail management job but, due to lack of access to appropriate care, she still hasn’t received the therapy critical to her recovery and eventual return to the workforce. In over 10 years, the paltry pension offered by her insurance company, far substandard to the B.C. government disability pension, hasn’t increased a single dollar to accommodate inflation, and furthermore leaves her without dental and (most) medical benefits.
To compound her woes, Tri-Cities Mental Health has closed her case permanently under the justification of “no further treatment options,” leaving her to fend for herself as her mental health deteriorates without bound.
In my efforts as an advocate, I’ve learned she isn’t eligible to collect the government disability pension, since another insurance agency is already “providing” for her, and due to an impassable thicket of political red tape, she cannot access desperately-needed psychiatric care — anywhere.
And while our province offers quality health care to rapists and murderers, Abby, a model citizen, continues to fall through the cracks. Currently, I’ve exhausted all my options and desperation is setting in as Abby’s mental health begins to tax my very own.
I am feverishly hoping for Premier Horgan himself to read my story and help me access psychiatric intervention not just for Abby but for everyone else in the system who cannot access the care they require. In my opinion, inhumane suffering shouldn’t be allowed to persist in a first-class country such as Canada.
Peter Toth, Port Coquitlam
