Climate crisis will increase health inequities among Indigenous communities: Federal government report

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Canadian Indigenous communities are suffering adverse health affects from climate change-related disasters, such as last year’s deadly heat dome and flooding in B.C., according to a new federal government report.

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According to the report, climate change will increase the health and socio-economic inequalities experienced by Indigenous peoples, including financial hardship and chronic and infectious diseases. Health of Canadians in a Changing Environment: Advancement of our Knowledge for Action. 

While the report assesses the risk of climate change to the health of all Canadians, chapter two — prepared by the the National Collaborating Centre for Indigenous Health — focuses on aboriginal health.

The centre’s academic leader Dr. Margo Greenwood said governments need to come up with clear strategies to help Indigenous communities, particularly those in rural areas that may not have access to the same cooling centres and evacuation centres as urban centres.

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Greenwood had experience with last year’s devastating wildfire season in B.C. and says the level of stress was “extraordinarily high” among affected Indigenous communities and many residents are still dealing with mental health problems and other trauma-related illness.

“There’s anxiety and concern just looking at the impacts to the land…the bodies of animals that perished,”she said, speaking in Prince George Friday.

“It’s extraordinarily sad. It is a terrible loss for all of us. It is difficult to imagine the spiritual connections many Indigenous people have with land. It can impact that connection. It can impact our ability to gather food, fish, or hunt. It’s all of those pieces as well. It’s a very wholistic impact.”

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Donna Atkinson, the centre’s manager who was also in Prince George, said while they were writing the chapter for the report, there were 10,000 people on evacuation order in her town.

“We had really poor air quality, and the mental health impacts were enormous,” said Atkinson. She noted that Indigenous communities may not have clean sources of drinking water, and during flooding, or a heat wave like B.C.’s deadly heat dome  last June, can lead to water-borne diseases as people try to stay cool and hydrated to survive.

Greenwood added that the trauma of losing a home to wildfire or flood coupled with the loss of forest habitat and other ecosystems they depend on is leading to long-term trauma that doesn’t go away without ongoing counselling.

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“Many people are still grieving, and I think that kind of trauma has the ability to trigger other past traumas as well, such as dislocation, and not being allowed to be in the territory where you grew up,” said Greenwood. “They are used to living on land and now they are in a hotel and that’s a huge change.”

They recommend that governments at all levels consider climate change when rebuilding infrastructure and that they provide programs and policies to help Indigenous people prepare themselves for the effects of a warming planet.

Climate displacement is a growing concern here in B.C. Extreme weather can force residents from their homes and it disproportionately impacts Indigenous peoples like Angie Thorne. Who told Postmedia last summerFour years after her Ashcroft house was destroyed by fire, she had not returned home.

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“Indigenous Peoples have been observing and adapting to changing environments since time immemorial. However, with mounting hazards such as major fires and floods, we are seeing that evacuation and dislocation have profound impacts on Indigenous peoples—amplifying the ongoing displacement of colonization,” said Greenwood.

“We have to learn to do things better.”

Atkinson stated that water sanitation is a major problem in Indigenous communities throughout the country and must be addressed immediately because climate catastrophes will make the water and food situation worse, leading to more chronic illness.

“I think the important part that we tried to stress in this chapter was that climate change really exacerbates these health impacts particularly where there is poverty.”

The National Collaborating Centre for Indigenous Health is working on a project to highlight some of the reports findings and make them more available to people, such as a series of webinars and podcasts to bring more First Nations’ voices to the climate change discussion.

The report’s chapter concludes that climate change represents one of the greatest threats to global health and Canada’s First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples’ perspectives, experiences, knowledges, and voices must be included in climate change discussions moving forward.

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