As Nurses, We Oppose BC’s New Paths to Forced Hospitalization

published on March 31, 2023 by Marilou Gagnon, Trevor Goodyear, Emily Jenkins, Allie Slemon, Elisabeth Bailey, and Michelle Danda in The Tyee

When the minister of health and the minister of mental health and addictions recently announced it had amended B.C.’s Mental Health Act to create a new pathway that allows nurse practitioners to certify involuntary admission and detention, we became concerned.

As nurses working in mental health and substance use, we have been paying close attention to the NDP government’s response to the drug poisoning crisis — a crisis responsible for the death of close to 12,000 people in B.C. since 2016.

Central to the NDP’s current response is a commitment to enacting legislative amendments and introducing policies to involuntarily admit and detain people who use substances under B.C.’s Mental Health Act…