World Mental Health Day- October 10th, 2019

CMHA Champlain East recognizes world mental health day

 On Thursday, Oct. 10, 2019, CMHA Champlain East will join international mental health organizations to celebrate World Mental Health Day. 

World Mental Health Day is supported by the World Health Organization as an important way to raise awareness and advocate for better care for those with mental health issues worldwide. The theme this year is working together to prevent suicide, in recognition of the scale of suicide around the world and the role that each of us can play to help prevent it.

Nearly 800,000 people die by suicide every year. For each suicide, there are over 20 suicide attempts. Suicide can have a ripple effect, impacting families, friends, colleagues, communities and societies. It’s the second-leading cause of death among 15-to-29-year-olds and 79 per cent of suicides occur in low and middle-income countries. However, suicide is preventable and working together we can make change.

To find more information about suicide prevention in Ontario, visit http://ontario.cmha.ca/documents/preventing-suicide/

World Homeless Day

World Homeless Day highlights the importance of supportive housing

Housing with supports is key to recovery for many people living with mental health or addictions issues. This is one of the main messages that CMHA Champlain East is sharing with the community to mark World Homeless Day this October 10.

Evidence indicates that having a place to call home means a better quality of life and success in education and work. And housing with appropriate supports is shown to improve outcomes from even severe mental health and addictions problems.

CMHA supports the ‘Housing First’ model, a person-centred approach that provides immediate access to permanent housing for people experiencing homelessness, without requiring psychiatric treatment or sobriety as determinants of ‘housing readiness.’ Research on this approach shows that it reduces hospitalization and increases housing stability significantly more than treatment alone.

In partnership with other stakeholders, CMHAs continues its efforts to promote the need for housing in general and supportive housing in particular for people with lived experience of mental illness. CMHAs have called for increased investments in housing, as well as the need to reduce barriers to housing as one way to reduce the overall costs to health care, police and justice, and social services sectors.

According to a 2016 report on homelessness, at least 235,000 people experience homelessness in a year across Canada and nearly 35,000 are homeless every night. And a 2018 report on youth homelessness also shows more than 6,000 Canadian youth are homeless on any given night.

Volunteer Board of Directors and Committee Member