Ruminations

Isolated and Vulnerable

With an area of 2,093,190 km, Nunavut is Canada's largest, northernmost territory. It was officially separated from the Northwest Territories in 1999 with the creation of the Nunavut Act, and in the official signing of the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement.

Geoff Robins/AFP/Getty Images The Iqaluit shoreline.

Iqaluit and Pangnirtung are Nunavut's major residential centers. They resemble lumber camps. The housing anything but impressive, reflecting the poverty of people living on the margins. There are no paved roads, but that is hardly surprising, there are more pressing problems in Canada's far northern regions, and the seasonal snow covering might seem to drown such features in a sea of white.

When the European Union righteously succumbed to the demands of environmentalists and animal rights campaigners by banning seal products from Canada entering their market, the ban affected the cultural and practical role of the seals hunted by Inuit living in Nunavut, as well as other, small-scale commercial hunters in Newfoundland, people similarly living marginally in small communities.

In this file photo, Inuit hunter Pitseolak Alainga explains how the Inuit traditionally hunt seal to Canada's Finance Minister Jim Flaherty outside the Nunavut Legislature in Iqaluit, Canada, February 6, 2010. (GEOFF ROBINS , AFP/Getty Images)

The culture of the Inuit results in a shared hunt; hunters putting extra meat from seals, whales and occasionally polar bears into community freezers to aid families who haven't enjoyed successful hunts, or families of women and children whose hunter-providers are missing. The skins are turned into everyday clothing for local families and for sale to outsiders.

There are some 40,000 Nunavimmiut (people who live in Nunavut) for whom seal hunting is of both heritage and practical importance. The EU's ban on seal products responded to posters of cuddly baby seals being bludgeoned, not hunted since the 1980s. There are some in Inuit communities who even design seal clothing for sale to those who appreciate its warmth and comfort. But they, like the Inuit involved in the tourist industry, are in an absolute minimum.

Most Inuit, in fact, particularly the young, are uneducated, unskilled and unemployed. There is scant conventional employment in Nunavut; the fortunate few may have government employment. The territory's citizens experience higher rates of major psychiatric illness and depression than the general Canadian population.

"It is devastating to me and to my coroners. We are exhausted, mentally stressed out. There is no end to it."

"We can bring the risk factors to the public in order to bring more awareness and let everybody know what the risks factors are. By this inquest, maybe we can bring more counselling services or more recreation centres in the communities which will reduce the social risk factors. By bringing in some recommendations, maybe governments will act and bring up more resources."

Dr. Padma Suramala, Nunavut's chief coroner

Dr. Suramala has called for an inquiry to address a record number of suicides in the territory in the year just passed. The year 2013 saw a significant increase from the previous high of 34 suicides, with 2013 reflecting a total of 45. This represents a figure that reflects a suicide rate in the territory among Inuit that is 13-1/2-times greater than the national average.

This tragic social malaise affects almost everyone in Nunavut, for almost everyone has been touched directly or indirectly by suicide. A major study that saw release last June concluded the territory's citizens experience sky-high rates of psychiatric illness and depression. The majority of deaths tend to be from among single, unemployed males, the average age 24.

They also expressed about double the rates of alcohol addiction and cannabis abuse than others in a control group.

About 50% of those who died by suicide had been sexually or physically abused as children. And two-thirds of those who died at their own hands had been diagnosed before death with severe depression. One problem is the lack of adequate mental-health services in the North; a mere 17% of those who committed suicide had been hospitalized for psychiatric problems, a like percentage prescribed medication.

Children in Pangnirtung, Nunavut, send a message during an anti-bullying workshop in the community, as part of the Embrace Life Council’s suicide prevention work in the territory. In 2013, 45 people took their lives in the worst year for suicide in the territory’s history. (David Kilabuk)

Boredom, isolation, lack of opportunities or incentive, all add to the toll taken on the young. These very small, isolated communities may seem stifling to the young, eager to experience the kind of life they know exists elsewhere, for they are not completely cut off from communication, can watch television to see how other Canadians live.

The very isolation and remoteness mitigates against a modern way of life. A way of life that is mostly rejected by traditionalists.

Nunavut has dedicated itself to a suicide prevention plan since 2011. Government and others have planned for public awareness and education campaigns and have brought counsellors into those tiny communities, allocating increased funding for those purposes. Lynn Ryan MacKenzie of Nunavut's Health Department insists progress has been made.

One community has placed a mental-health worker in its school. And it organizes social gatherings for people, along with soccer games for youngsters.

"It's part of the solution. It's building relationships and breaking down the stigma around mental illness. The less isolated people are, it helps reduce the risk.

"Those of us that are working on this, it challenges us to recommit our efforts and redouble our efforts."

Lynn Ryan MacKenzie