I was sad to read Helen Sarrazin's response to the story of two local UNBC researchers being awarded much needed research support for collaborative studies of Indigenous elder mental health.
Rather than be pleased with this deservedly special attention for a population whose suffering she clearly is ignorant of, Sarrazin turns this good news into a zero-sum game, based on the assumption that anything done especially for native people takes away from attention to all seniors.
In fact, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research have an annual budget of over $1 billion, substantial amounts of which go to the Institute of Aging which has diverse program of research on mental health issues for all the elderly.
Sarrazin chooses to see the UNBC grant as an affront, implying that there is nothing special about the situation of Indigenous elders, notwithstanding what most thinking Canadians now understand about the unique impacts of residential schooling, the legacy of stolen lands and resources, forced relocations, bad water and housing, and by far the most depressing statistics in most every category including addictions, tragic deaths including suicide, etc.
This is not even to mention the day-to-day overt and covert racism that most Indigenous elders have had to face their entire lives, bigoted attitudes that inevitably leak out when anything positive happens to them.
Norman Dale
Prince George
