Seven years ago, when I worked in the mental health field, mental illness was still pretty shameful. People hid their conditions to save their jobs. Families crumbled under the weight of alcohol and drug addictions. Seniors were locked away with dementia. We knew there were plenty of challenges ahead of us. Government hearings led by Senators Michael Kirby and Wilbert Keon heard from psychiatrists, social workers, psychologists and ordinary folk about how mental illness was ruining lives and costing Canadian business millions of dollars in lost productivity. Then, under the Martin government, an announcement came that the government had heard our cry, and was establishing a Mental Health Commission to look at ways to bring mental illness "out of the shadows". That was just before the election but the Harper government later embraced the idea and appointed Kirby as the commission's first head. Doctors clamored to get on board the mental illness gravy train. Corporati...
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