Manitoba youth with addictions face limited services, long waitlists, geographic barriers: report

A new report from the Manitoba Advocate for Children and Youth paints a picture of the state of addictions services for young people in the province and what needs to change.

It draws on interviews with 39 youth in Winnipeg, Brandon, Steinbach, Thompson and northern Manitoba, and roundtable discussions with over 120 service providers that work with youth.

"This report has a soul. We've released many reports in our office that has to do with children dying, and this report, we spoke to youth that are still here today," said Sherry Gott, the Manitoba advocate. She spoke at a news conference in Winnipeg where the report, Innagakeyaa Bimadizewin: Towards the good life, was released.

Gott said it doesn't offer new recommendations, but rather amplifies the concerns and suggestions of those most affected by the youth addictions system — youth who use substances and service providers, whose voices highlight some of the main inadequacies of the system.

The report is intended to be a resource that policymakers can use as a guide toward improving the system.

Some of the concerns youth identified include limited access to services, long waitlists, geographic barriers, and a lack of integrated mental health support and harm reduction services.

Those working in the field say problems include underfunding, staff shortages and a lack of collaboration between agencies.

"It is clear that fundamental systemic and structural changes are urgently needed in order to help give every single young person the best chance at surviving and thriving," Gott says in the report.

Her office has seen a significant increase in the number of people trying to access addictions services, she said, and has previously called on the province to develop a youth-focused addictions strategy.

"We have learned that fractured and siloed approaches and services are ineffective, and that young people want and need strategies and services that are integrated, holistic and comprehensive," Gott's report says.

"We must listen to the youth and ensure that their needs, rights and interests are at the centre of all that we do."

In a separate announcement on Thursday, the province said it is working to create a new virtual crisis consultation service to provide clinical advice to those who work with children and youth struggling with addictions.

It's also allocating $2.4 million to increase psychiatric nurse support at Winnipeg's Health Sciences Centre and $1.5 million to hire more mental health clinicians across the province to work with children in crisis, a provincial news release said.

In a written statement, the Manitoba Association of Health Care Professionals said it welcomes the provincial funding, but more investment and a new contract for mental health and addictions professionals are needed to recruit and retain staff. 

'Helping but not helping'

The advocate's report also says Manitoba's current youth addictions system is largely ill-equipped to meet the complex needs of many young people, and is loaded with persistent and long-standing gaps and barriers.

Gott's office has found that youth struggling with drug and alcohol dependency are disproportionately Indigenous, and often have mental health issues and troubled childhoods.

"Most youth connected their substance use to past trauma, including experiences of sexual exploitation, abuse and poverty. They told us they used substances as coping mechanisms, or as one youth put it, to make memories go away," said MACY researcher Gen Sander.

"But they also recognized that this tends to exacerbate their existing problems and cause further harm, a cycle which another youth referred to as 'helping but not helping.'"

Many experienced stigma, shame, discrimination and/or punishment because of their substance use, "which understandably deterred them from seeking support," Sander said. Another common theme was not knowing how to ask for help.

"So many youth said they didn't know what words to use or how to even talk about it."

Youth cited a lack of information and outreach on available services. Some talked about only learning about supports when they were incarcerated.

"The fact that some youth need to get to the point of being criminally charged to receive information about services is highly problematic," the report says.

And even for some youth who had been given supports and information about the services available, some described it as being very basic without a phone number or address, "so it wasn't actually that helpful," Sander said.

One youth acknowledged that calling, making and committing to appointments was challenging because of their substance use, and said they wished they could have had additional support in those early, difficult steps, Sander said.

Further, the centralization of services in urban centres makes it difficult, if not impossible, for youth in northern rural and remote communities to access help in a timely manner, the report said.

They are often forced to leave their families and communities, often at great financial and emotional costs, to get the supports they need.

"The report is an urgent call to action to come together to reform Manitoba's youth addiction services to reflect the need for culturally safe, youth-centred, and trauma-informed care, aligned with best practices and children's rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child," it says.

Gott's office released a report on youth living with addictions earlier this year. It said advocacy requests for youth living with addictions jumped to 22 per cent from three per cent in the past five years.

Her office also found a concerning number of young people have died from a suspected overdose.

A team reviewed child and youth deaths from 2018 to 2023 and found 56 youth deaths related to possible drug overdoses or substance use.