Holistic Approach Key to Improving Children's Health

Summary

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There's no shortage of statistics showing that, when in comes to the areas of health and welfare, Aboriginal children in Canada are at a great disadvantage in comparison to the general population. According to the Web site of the Many Hands, One Dream initiative, the infant mortality rate among First Nations and Inuit populations is two to three times the infant mortality rate for Canada as a whole. Aboriginal children are four times as likely to die due to unintentional injuries, and the suicide rate among Aboriginal people is six times the national average. Aboriginal youth have higher rates of diabetes and higher rates of dental decay, and are more likely to be exposed to poor living conditions, which helps contribute to a spread of communicable diseases among Aboriginal populations that is greater than the rate for the Canadian population by tenfold.

Marie Adele Davis is executive director of the CPS, which was involved in co-ordinating two recent conferences where the health and welfare of Aboriginal youth was on the table. From April 20 to 22, The CPS partnered with the American Academy of Pediatrics to host the 2nd International Meeting on Indigenous Child Health. The conference, held in Montreal, chose "Solutions, Not Problems" as it's theme, and was held to discuss solutions to some of the health problems facing Aboriginal children on both sides of the border. Then, on April 25 and 26, the society joined forces with the Canadian Medical Association and the College of Family Physicians of Canada to host the Child Health Summit in Ottawa, which featured a number of presentations and discussions dealing specifically with health issues facing Aboriginal children.

"You don't tend to think of it as causing a medical condition, but a loss of the language in many of the places seems to have led up to many of these things. A loss of the traditional family structure, sometimes caused by the residential school experience, has been a big factor that has led up to many of the things. A loss of the culture in general and the loss of the land. The whole real loss of the lifestyle tends to be what leads into these things. So there's some pockets of the country that are dealing more with asthma ... and there's others that are dealing more with obesity. There's other pockets that are dealing more with substance abuse. And the real common theme seems to be the underlying causes rather than the individual medical conditions that we're looking at."

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Extract

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Holistic Approach Key to Improving Children's Health

There's no shortage of statistics showing that, when in comes to the areas of health and welfare, Aboriginal children in Canada are at a great disadvantage in comparison to the general population. According to the Web site of the Many Hands, One Dream initiative, the infant mortality rate among First Nations and Inuit populations is two to three times the infant mortality rate for Canada as a whole. Aboriginal children are four times as likely to die due to unintentional injuries, and the suicide rate among Aboriginal people is six...

See the full content of this document

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