The chair of the Abbotsford board of education said she was moved to tears when she learned that her son’s story had been shared as a reason to support a national strategy on brain injury.
Shirley Wilson said she also cried when the second reading of Bill C-277 received unanimous support in the House of Commons on June 12.
The bill provides for the development of a national strategy to support and improve brain injury awareness, prevention and treatments as well as the rehabilitation and recovery of people living with a brain injury.
“The positive outcomes by equalizing and levelling up care means lives are saved, homelessness is reduced, mental health is better supported, and medical treatment is more readily available,” Wilson said.
She was among those involved in a campaign that called on the federal government to implement a national strategy for brain injury.
The 125 Days to Say Yes campaign began in January to coincide with the 125 days the House sits from January to December.
The private member’s bill has now been referred to the standing committee on health, which will examine the bill in detail, hold hearings and invite witnesses.
Wilson’s son, Jacob, suffered a traumatic brain injury after he was struck by a pickup truck in August 2018 at the age of 21 while he was walking along Marshall Road in Abbotsford.
He was resuscitated three times by medical teams that night.
Over the last years of his life, the devastating injuries he sustained led to isolation, psychosis, drug addiction and his death by an accidental fentanyl overdose on Nov. 11, 2021 at the age of 24.
Wilson, in partnership with the Abbotsford Police Department, shared her and Jacob’s story in a YouTube video in April 2023. Wilson said her son struggled to find the right care after his brain injury.
Jacob’s story was among those shared by B.C. MP Alistair MacGregor (Cowichan-Malahat-Langford) in the House of Commons on June 12 in moving that Bill C-277 proceed to the next stage.
“Brain injuries are often known as the hidden epidemic because the people who have them do not always bear physical scars,” MacGregor said.
He said brain injuries are categorized as either “traumatic” – through assaults, playing sports or car crashes – or “non-traumatic” such as from strokes, overdoses and aneurysms.
MacGregor said an estimated 160,000 new cases occur each year in Canada, and there are an estimated 1.5 million current cases.
“We know that brain injuries contribute to homelessness, incarceration, substance use and mental-health issues. We know that brain injury survivors face a 200 per cent increased risk of struggling with addictions, and their risk of suicide increases by 400 percent after a brain injury,” he said.
But MacGregor said despite these statistics, funding for awareness, prevention and treatment “pales in comparison” with that of “many other ailments.”
The 11 measures in the bill include providing a support system in the community for people living with a brain injury, identifying challenges resulting from brain injury, creating national guidelines, and promoting research and improving data collection on the incidence and treatment of brain injury.
After the committee stage is complete, Bill C-277 comes back to the House for consideration of third reading and a vote on whether to pass it in its final form.
If it passes third reading, the bill is then sent to the Senate, where it goes through similar stages. If passed there, it is sent to the governor-general for royal assent, after which it becomes law.
Wilson said having the bill move to the standing committee on health means “everything” to her and those who have worked on promoting it.
“It's too late for Jacob, but it is so important for those who need it today,” she said.
Brain Injury Canada is now encouraging individuals and organizations to send letters of support for the bill to the standing committee on health, which resumes in September.
Visit braininjurycanada.ca/en/bill-c-277 for more information.
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